CHICAGO 

BY 

GASLIGHT 


SAMUEL  PAYNTFK  WILSON 


LIBRARY  OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

AT  URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 

IN  MEMORY  OF 

STEWART  S.  HOWE 

JOURNALISM  CLASS  OF  1928 

STEWART  S.  HOWE  FOUNDATION 


170 
W694C 


T.H.S. 


CHICAGO  BY  GASLIGHT 

BY 
SAMUEL  PAYNTER  WILSON 

Author   of  "Wilson's  Historical  Events,"  "Wilson's  Con« 
cise  History,"  "Chicago  and  Its  Cess-Pools," 
"The  Story  of  Lena  Murphy" 

Short  Stories 

"A  Mother's  Story,"  "Captain  Dun  well's  Will,"  "Was  It 
Her  Fault,"  "Two  Hearts  that  Beat  as  One,"  "A  Lawyer's 
Narrative,"  "The  Two  Mothers,"  "Birds  and  Babies," 
"Rural  Scenes  and  Incidents"  being  a  Poem  in  three 
cantos,"  "A  Farewell  to  Innocence,"  "The  Gates  of  Hell," 
"The  Cauldron  of  Woe,"  "The  Romance  of  Crime." 


MR.  SAMUEL  PAYNTER  WILSON, 

Chicago,  111. 

MY  DEAR  FRIEND: 

I  have  read  your  book  with  great  interest.  It 
tells  the  truth,  though  no  book  can  tell  all  the 
truth.  You  have  been  a  great  help  to  our  com- 
munity l)y  the  practical  and  useful  service  you 
have  rendered  in  the  investigation  of  vice  and  the 
bringing  of  those  responsible  for  it  to  justice. 
Our  city  is  the  better  for  your  work. 

I  hope  your  book  will  do  much  good.  If  par- 
ents but  knew  the  dangers  that  confront  their 
boys  and  girls  in  our  great  cities,  they  would  at 
least  take  some  ordinary  precautions  before  turn- 
ing their  children  adrift  amid  these  perils. 

MORTON  CULVER  HARTZELL, 
President  Douglas  Neighborhood  Club, 


PREFACE 


I  stood  on  the  corner  of  a  down-town  street  one 
night  in  December,  and  as  I  watched  the  seething 
sea  of  humanity  passing  by,  and  as  I  looked  into 
their  weary,  anxious  faces,  I  never  felt  more 
strongly  in  my  life  the  necessity  for  the  work  on 
the  part  of  the  forces  that  are  making  for  the 
moral  and  social  uplift  of  the  city.  There,  in  great 
masses  before  my  eyes  was  the  good  and  the  bad, 
and  it  was  easy  to  make  the  distinction.  The  whole 
maddening  throng  seemed  bent  on  unrighteous  and 
riotous  pleasure.  The  whole  tendency  was  down- 
ward, and  nothing  of  elevating  or  enobling  influ- 
ence was  before  me  there.  To  me  it  appeared  the 
death  of  youth,  and  the  grave  of  manhood  and 
womanhood. 

All  that  was  base  and  ignoble  in  a  great  city 
was  portrayed  in  the  vivid  picture  before  me,  and 
as  I  gazed  on  the  throng  I  could  see  the  breaking 
down  of  virtue,  which  ought  to  be  strong  in  every 
woman. 

7 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

My  position  was  near  the  entrance  to  a  * 'fash- 
ionable drinking  house/'  one  which  bids  high  for 
the  gilded  youth  to  go  the  limit,  and  as  the  pleas- 
ure-bent wended  their  way  into  this  palace  of 
sin,  it  seemed  to  me  the  quick  death  of  the  finer 
sensibilities  of  manhood  and  womanhood,  the 
welding  of  the  links  in  the  chain  that  binds  them 
forever  to  the  slavery  of  drink. 

I  could  not  help  thinking  that  this  disgraceful 
orgy  before  my  eyes  was  an  everlasting  shame 
to  every  person  connected  with  it.  The  tendency 
of  the  whole  place  was  downward,  and  placed  a 
disgraceful  premium  on  lewdness.  The  vulgar 
display  appealed  to  all  that  is  worst  in  mankind, 
and  breeds  contempt  for  law  and  decency.  I  saw 
in  it  the  inevitable  swelling  of  the  "red  light " 
district,  for  here  could  be  seen  the  "painted  ma- 
dame  "  stretching  her  arms  in  an  invitation  to  the 
young  maidens  of  the  city.  Here  could  be  seen 
the  effects  of  the  "  saloon "  and  of  all  the  evils 
that  follow  in  its  wake.  Sitting  at  the  tables  the 
hilarity  of  the  young  men  and  women  attests  to 
the  revelry  and  debauchery  that  the  city  openly 
tolerates,  and  even  encourages. 

As  I  listened  to  the  music  I  wondered  if  a 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

thought  of  home  or  their  mother  ever  came  to 
their  minds,  and  I  said  to  myself,  if  so,  such 
thoughts  are  choked  in  the  scenes  of  vice  and 
debauchery,  and  whatever  good  there  is  left  in 
them  is  crushed  by  such  unspeakably  coarse  sur- 
roundings. 

My  heart  was  sad;  and  it  was  here  I  made  a 
vow  that  I  would  fight  the  cursed  traffic  with  all 
the  force  and  strength  at  my  command. 

It  is  with  this  aim  in  view  that  this  little  book 
is  published. 

SAMUEL  PAYNTER  WILSON. 


Some 
Personal  Experiences 

In  presenting  to  the  public  the  experiences  I 
have  had,  and  of  the  results  attained  as  an  in- 
vestigator in  an  Association,  which  has  gained 
a  world  wide  reputation  for  " doing  things"  in 
the  sociological  world,  it  is  with  a  hope  that  I 
may  find  a  genial  public,  and  create  a  more  force- 
ful and  lasting  impression  with  my  friends. 

This  little  work  is  the  result  of  my  own  per- 
sonal investigation  among  a  class  of  men  and 
women,  who  belong  to  the  underworld,  and  the 
work  has  been  accompanied  with  much  personal 
danger  and  often  required  the  courage  and  ex- 
perience of  one  versed  in  the  ways  of  the  crim- 
inal— one  who  has  the  ability  to  be  a  judge  of  hu- 
man nature  and  a  good  " mixer." 

The  men  and  women  with  whom  we  come  in 
contact  are  scoundrels  by  nature  and  cowards  at 
heart;  they  stab  you  in  the  back  and  shoot  you 


11 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

from  dark  alleys;  they  are  continually  on  the 
lookout  for  victims  and  usually  find  the  harvest 
bountiful,  and  the  matter  contained  in  this  book 
is  merely  to  give  expression  in  language  so  sim- 
ple that  all  may  understand  its  meaning.  There 
are  plague  spots  in  almost  every  part  of  the  great 
city  and  vultures  prey  upon  the  innocent  and 
descend  upon  the  city  by  daylight  and  by  gas- 
light without  warning  of  their  coming. 

The  white  slave  dealers  flaunt  their  dastardly 
vice  in  the  face  of  the  public,  and  houses  of  ill- 
fame  are  conducted  with  a  boldness  unequalled 
anywhere  in  the  world.  The  evil  is  very  great 
and  assuming  larger  proportions  every  year.  In 
procuring  evidence,  and  in  bringing  many  of 
these  unfortunates  before  the  courts,  and  after 
listening  to  the  defendants  in  giving  testimony, 
I  have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  virtue  in  Chi- 
cago is  at  a  very  low  ebb,  and  that  the  home- 
loving  virtuous  wife  or  mother  is  a  jewel  that  the 
gods  should  crave  and  that  decent  manhood 
should  love,  honor  and  worship. 

It  is  sad,  indeed,  that  wives  of  apparent  re- 
spectability should  be  drawn  into  this  life  of 
shame,  but  nevertheless  it  hangs  like  a  pall  over 


12 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

the  city  and  innocence  and  virtue  is  trampled  in 
the  dust. 

Devastation  is  everywhere  in  view.  The  ruined 
lives  and  homes  of  men  and  women  is  manifest, 
and  the  evil  continues.  Look  where  you  may; 
take  up  any  of  the  daily  papers  and  the  first  ar- 
ticle your  eyes  observe,  perchance,  will  be  of 
some  home  broken  up  by  the  unchaste  wife  or 
husband/ This  state  of  affairs  is  deeply  to  be  de- 
plored and  should  bring  a  blush  of  shame  to  the 
true  manhood  and  womanhood  of  our  city.  It  is 
everywhere.  We  touch  elbows  with  it  in  the 
streets,  where  thousands  parade  daily.  The  veiled 
and  insiduous  evil  is  one,  which  until  recently  has 
worked  as  secretly  and  as  damnably  as  the 
vicious  habits  of  the  frequenters  of  the  disrepu- 
table establishments  could  desire. 

Listen !  I  have  witnessed  young  boys  and  girls 
in  their  tender  years,  reeling,  staggering  drunk, 
going  and  coming  from  vile  dens  (so-called  con- 
cert saloons)  and  not  a  hand  raised  to  stay  their 
downward  career.  I  have  seen  mothers  with  tears 
streaming  down  their  sunken  cheeks,  eyes  swol- 
len from  weeping  tears  of  blood,  stand  in  front 
of  these  devil-dealing  places,  pleading  with  their 


13 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

children  to  return  to  their  home.  I  have  witnessed 
the  proprietor  or  employee  push  this  heartbroken 
woman  into  the  street,  call  a  policeman  and  have 
her  rushed  off  to  the  nearest  police  station.  It  was 
my  good  fortune  to  have  the  acquaintance  of  the 
lieutenant  at  the  station.  I  at  once  mounted  a 
passing  car  and  arrived  at  police  headquarters  at 
the  same  moment  the  crestfallen,  heartbroken 
woman  had  been  brought  before  the  officer  in 
charge.  Acquainting  him  with  the  facts  in  the 
case,  he  had  the  woman  released,  and  reprimand- 
ed the  officer  who  made  the  arrest. 

For  some  reason  unknown  to  the  general  pub- 
lic the  policemen  favor  the  underworld.  Money 
talks.  The  dishonest  policemen  are  few,  how- 
ever, and  I  have  never  witnessed,  and  do  not 
know  of  a  single  policeman  or  officer  who  has 
violated  his  oath  of  office.  We  do  know,  how- 
ever, that  they  seem  to  be  shackled,  and  seldom, 
if  ever,  go  against  the  evildoer  until  driven  to  it 
by  the  reform  element.  Call  it  graft,  politics  or 
whatever  you  may,  the  general  tendency  is  to 
shield  the  law-breaker. 

Orders  are  issued  by  the  superior  officer,  and 
it  is  generally  conceded  that  he  "winks  the  other 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT 

eye,"  for  the  orders,  as  a  rule,  are  trailed  in  the 
dust,  showing  conclusively  that  they  were  made 
to  be  broken.  The  dark  shame  of  it  all  is,  that 
the  public — the  taxpayers,  do  not  rise  up  as  a 
man  and  break  the  chain  that  has  held  the  de- 
cent citizens  captive  for  past  generations. 

\         Houses  of  Shame. 

Houses  of  assignation  abound  everywhere.  Go 
where  you  will,  in  any  quarter  of  the  city  and 
the  experienced  eye  will  see  evidence  of  the 
blighting  influence  of  this  feature  of  "Social 
life."  The  handsomest  apartment  buildings  in 
the  city  are  frequently  infested  with  women  who 
ply  their  trade  with  a  boldness  that  is  seldom 
tolerated  in  a  well-governed  city.  Disreputable 
real  estate  men  are  chiefly  responsible  for  this 
condition  of  affairs,  however;  the  "Almighty  Dol- 
lar" to  them  is  evidence  of  "good  character," 
and  so  the  evil  runs  its  course  unchallenged. 
Another  gigantic  feature  is  that  dissolute  women 
establish  themselves  in  swell  apartment  houses 
and  advertise  rooms  to  rent,  similar  to  the  fol- 
lowing : 


15 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

"Michigan  Ave. — 43 — Apartment  204.  Lady 
has  beautifully  furnished  rooms  for  couple  or 
gentleman.  Phone  Calumet " 

Accompanied  by  another  gentleman,  I  called  at 
the  above  place  in  answer  to  the  advertisement 
in  order  to  satisfy  myself  as  to  the  character  of 
the  place.  Imagine  our  surprise  to  find  that  we 
could  secure  rooms  and  lady  companion  "  thrown 
in."  We  made  short  work  of  this  "housekeeper" 
in  the  courts  next  day. 

So  all  along  the  line  the  experienced  person 
finds  evidence  of  immorality  and  crime,  and  one 
less  wise  can  close  one  eye  and  walk  straightway 
to  cess-pools  innumerable.  Last  year  more  than 
fifty  places  similar  to  the  one  mentioned  have  had 
a  hearing  in  court. 

A  flagrant  case  can  appropriately  be  mentioned 
here.  I  was  called  to  Lieutenant  Z  ^  f •  ^  E  R — >s 
office,  who  stated  to  me  that  he  was  suspicious  of 
a  certain  woman  having  quarters  in  one  of  the 
elite  sections  of  the  city,  and  that  his  officers  were 
unable  to  obtain  the  evidence  that  would  convict 
her,  and  requested  me  to  secure  for  him  the 
proper  evidence,  if  possible.  After  two  weeks  of 
strenuous  work,  dodging  between  houses,  jump- 


16 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

ing  alley  fences,  making  peace  with  "bull-dogs" 
that  were  not  "over  friendly"  and  only  willing 
to  "show  us"  the  kindly  interest  they  had  in  us, 
we  found  few  volunteers  who  were  anxious  to 
enlist  in  our  cause.  After  repeated  calls  at  the 
house  in  question,  we  gained  information  that 
satisfied  us' as  to  the  character  of  the  place,  but 
not  sufficient  to  convict;  though  we  were  told 
by  the  keeper  that  she  would  accommodate  us, 
would  send  for  ladies — that  her  ladies  who  re- 
ceived were  married  women  who  would  respond 
to  a  telephone  call,  and  so  on.  But  as  there 
were  no  women  in  the  house,  and  having  been 
"thrown  down"  for  the  third  time  and  informed 
that  she  was  afraid  we  were  detectives  and  re- 
fusing to  have  us  call  again,  it  was  then  that 
the  alleys,  fences  and  bull-dog  course  was  pur- 
sued. This  was  in  late  November  and  we  ex- 
perienced no  Southern  zephyrs  wafting  between 
the  tall,  dark  houses  as  we  stood  between  them, 
chancing  a  stray  shot  from  a  neighboring  win- 
dow. The  proprietress  was  a  smooth  proposition 
to  handle,  but  our  chance  finally  arrived,  and 
the  crafty  woman  was  placed  in  the  hands  of 
the  poli<"  4fter  much  false  swearing  by  the 


17 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

woman  and  inmates,  our  evidence  was  found  to 
be  conclusive  and  the  jury  gave  the  heaviest  fine 
the  statutes  provided. 

The  dangers  encountered  are  often  very  great. 
I  recall  an  incident  which  took  myself  and  an- 
other investigator  to  one  of  the  low-down  saloon 
and  concert  halls  one  stormy  night  in  Decem- 
ber. The  snow  and  sleet  was  descending  in  blind- 
ing sheets  and  it  was  with  difficulty  that  we 
made  our  way  towards  the  goal  we  sought.  Ar- 
riving at  our  destination  we  at  once  opened  a 
side  door  that  entered  the  hallway  leading  up  to 
the  second  story  of  the  building.  There  was  a 
door  leading  from  the  drinking  room  where  the 
disreputable  men  and  women  held  "high  carni- 
val/' Just  as  we  reached  the  top  of  the  land- 
ing, two  burly,  rough  men  came  rushing  toward 
us  and  demanded  to  know  our  business.  Upon 
being  told  that  we  wanted  to  see  the  "girls" 
they  said  to  us  in  words  not  to  be  repeated:  "We 
have  no  "girls"  up  here;  you  get  out  of  here 
or  we  will  pitch  you  through  that  window," 
pointing  to  a  window  overlooking  the  alley.  "A 
bluff"  goes  sometimes,  as  it  did  in  this  case.  I 
said  to  the  man  nearest  to  me,  "0,  come  now, 

18 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

don't  be  angry,  my  friend  is  a  cattle  dealer  from 
Iowa,  and  I  am  only  showing  him  the  sights,  and 
seeing  the  " hotel  sign"  thought  we  would  put 
up  for  the  night  with  you."  Near  us  stood  a 
round  table  and  chairs  (a  sure  sign  of  something 
doing).  I  said  to  him,  "be  a  good  fellow  and 
bring  us  up  some  beer."  Sizing  us  up,  he  said, 
"Well,  I  don't  know  you'se  feller's,  an'  I'm  tak- 
ing no  chances,  see ."  In  order  to  "stick"  and  col- 
lect the  information  we  were  after,  I  said  to  him, 
" That's  all  right,  bring  up  the  beer  and  we  will 
go  away,"  and  with  angry  growls,  the  two  men 
departed  for  the  drink  ordered.  When  the  man 
returned  we  had  all  the  evidence  needed  to  arrest 
and  convict  the  owner  for  allowing  the  house 
to  be  used  for  immoral  purposes.  The  evidence 
was  easily  enough  collected,  for  just  as  the  men 
mentioned  disappeared,  two  flashily  dressed 
women  came  out  of  adjoining  rooms  and  insisted 
on  us  "buying  the  drinks." 

The  proprietor  was  indignant  when  he  re- 
turned, to  find  the  women  sitting  at  the  table 
where  we  had  previously  seated  ourselves.  Pay- 
ing for  our  beer,  we  immediately  departed.  Had 
the  proprietor  known  who  we  were,  and  that  we 


19 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

were  seeking  information  in  order  to  bring  about 
his  downfall,  the  chances  are  that  trouble  would 
have  ensued. 

Mather  and  Child. 

There  are  many  mothers  in  Chicago  who  for  a 
few  dollars  will  sell  their  souls  and  not  content 
with  that,  will  offer  up  to  mammon  the  souls  of 
their  children.  As  incredible  as  it  may  seem, 
metropolitan  life  not  only  asks  for  the  mother, 
but  for  her  child  also.  It  often  occurs,  and  if  you 
will  take  a  peek  almost  any  night  into  the  cheap 
concert  saloon,  you  will  see  women  with  little 
children  sitting  on  their  knees.  If  you  listen, 
above  the  din  of  the  half  drunken  men  and 
women  you  will  hear  the  voice  of  the  child,  sing- 
ing: "What  would  you  take  for  me  papa,  if 
somebody  wanted  to  buy/'  etc.,  while  some 
"pimp"  is  thumping  the  life  out  of  the  rented 
piano.  Pay  attention,  now!  Look  and  you  will 
see  some  painted,  blear-eyed  woman  walk  up 
and  plant  a  kiss  on  the  mouth  of  the  child,  and 
drop  a  coin  into  the  palm  of  the  mother.  This  is 
a  vile,  vicious  proceeding,  and  should  call  forth 


20 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

the  condemnation  of  even  our  sleepy  police.  When 
I  witnessed  the  scene  just  mentioned,  my  indig- 
nation was  complete,  but  I  was  powerless  to  act. 
Notwithstanding  the  danger  I  exposed  myself 
to,  I  walked, over  to  the  part  of  the  hall  where 
the  heartless  mother  sat  and  inquired  why  she 
brought  her  child  to  a  place  of  this  character. 
Her  answer  was,  "The  money  there's  in  it." 
"Yes,  but  are  you  not  afraid  your  child  will  be- 
come one  of  the  town?"  "  'fraid  of  no  thin';  you 
'tend  to  your  business,  and  I'll  'tend  to  mine." 
I  said  to  her  that  our  association  would  help  her 
find  employment  if  she  wished  us  to.  She  refused 
my  proffered  assistance.  I  then  said  to  her,  "If 
I  ever  see  you  with  that  child  in  a  place  like  this 
again,  I  will  have  you  arrested  and  the  child 
taken  care  of  by  the  county."  I  also  called  the 
attention  of  the  proprietor  of  the  place  to  the  fact 
that  he  would  be  served  with  papers  of  arrest 
should  I  find  further  violations  of  the  law  in  his 
establishment.  "Easy  money!"  that's  the  word. 
The  race  for  wealth  is  a  very  exacting  one  and 
souls  are  being  sold  every  day  for  the  "Almighty 
Dollar." 


21 


The  Renting  Evil 

Vice  in  the  Metropolis  is  fostered  by  a  class  of 
disreputable  real  estate  men,  who  cherish  money 
more  than  they  do  the  good  reputation  of  the 
community.  In  the  work,  the  Association  with 
which  I  am  connected  is  doing,  the  greatest  ob- 
stacle has  been  to  overcome  the  damage  done 
in  resident  districts  by  renting  to  disreputable 
women.  It  necessitates  a  constant  watchfulness. 
Often  the  situation  calls  for  prompt  action,  and 
the  law  is  our  only  recourse.  For  the  benefit  of 
anyone  who  may  chance  to  read  this  book,  this 
information  is  freely  given:  To  dislodge  a  dis- 
reputable person  from  a  dwelling,  the  owner  of 
the  building,  the  real  estate  dealer  who  rented  to 
them,  and  the  woman  in  question  may  be  brought 
into  court.  In  Illinois  the  statutes  require  fifteen 
days'  notice  to  be  given  to  the  owner  of  the 
building  and  the  real  estate  man.  This  is  in  or- 
der to  give  them  time  to  serve  notice  on  the  ten- 
ants. After  evidence  has  been  secured  against 


23 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

the  tenant,  warrants  may  be  obtained  at  once 
for  the  arrest  of  the  woman  and  inmates.  The 
maximum  fine  is  $200.00  for  each  offense.  The 
law  is  the  same  for  proprietors  of  houses  of  as* 
signation  as  well  as  houses  of  prostitution.  Our 
Association  fights  the  millionaire  and  the  poor 
illiterate  saloonkeeper  with  the  same  degree  of 
faithfulness.  We  do  not  persecute,  but  prose- 
cute. We  ask  no  favors  and  show  no  quarter 
when  the  vicious  assail  us,  but  the  repentant  man 
or  woman  find  in  us  the  benefactor  and  many 
instances  can  be  related  where  acts  of  Christian 
charity  have  been  offered  to  the  offending  man 
or  woman. 

I  recall  a  case  which  aroused  my  sympathy  re- 
cently.   My  attention  had  been  previously  called 

to  a  house  on St.,  asking  me  to  have 

the  occupant  removed.  I  was  prompt  in  making 
investigation  and  soon  found  that  my  informant 's 
surmise  was  well  founded.  The  case  was  report- 
ed to  the  lieutenant  of  the  district,  who  ordered 
the  madame  to  remove  at  once.  About  nine 
o'clock  on  the  night  in  question  the  door  bell  of 
my  residence  rang  out  with  a  loud  jingle.  The 
night  was  one  of  the  worst  I  have  ever  known. 

24 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

The  snow  beat  down  with  furious  pelts,  the  wind 
blew  with  cruel,  biting  blasts,  and  as  I  opened 
the  door  to  greet  the  visitor  the  fine  mist  scinti- 
lating  in  the  gaslight  gave  a  dramatic  effect,  and 
formed  a  striking  background  for  the  woman 
standing  at  my  threshold.  Imagine  my  surprise 
to  find  in  my  guest  the  poor  outcast  of  society 
the  police  had  ordered  to  move.  Though  richly 
and  warmly  clad,  she  told  a  story  of  anguish  that 
would  have  melted  a  heart  more  hardened  than 
mine.  She  broke  down  completely,  and  after  lis- 
tening to  her  story  I  was  powerless  to  push  her 
case  at  once,  and  gave  her  time  to  close  her  es- 
tablishment, extracting  a  promise  that  she  would 
allow  no  visitors  at  her  home  in  the  meantime. 
The  extension  was  allowed  in  order  that  no  hard- 
ship should  ensue  to  the  slowly  dying  mother  of 
the  keeper. 

Debasing  influences  are  continually  at  work 
among  the  young  of  our  city  and  call  for  unceas- 
ing vigilence.  In  my  work  as  an  investigator  I 
came  to  the  conclusion  that  the  house  of  assig- 
nation assumes  tremendous  proportions  and 
should  be  handled  in  a  rigorous  manner.  The 
practice  of  renting  rooms  to  "all  comers,"  re- 


CHICAGO  BY  GAb  LIGHT. 

gardless  of  age  or  sex,  men  and  women,  single  or 
otherwise,  boys  and  girls,  is  a  vicious  one  and 
should  be  stamped  out.  The  law  demanding  only 
that  you  register  as  man  and  wife,  with  no  furth- 
er requirements,  is  insufficient.  It  is  almost  im- 
possible to  convict  the  keepers  who  throw  their 
houses  open  to  "  transients. ' '  Evidence  is  hard 
to  obtain.  The  investigator  must  use  discretion, 
and  is  often  obliged  to  partially  incriminate 
himself  in  order  to  collect  the  evidence  sufficient 
to  bring  the  keeper  to  account.  The  law  in  many 
instances  seems  to  favor  the  criminal.  The  bur- 
den falls  heavily  on  the  prosecutor,  and  no  mat- 
ter how  morally  depraved  and  sinful  the  defend- 
ant, there  must  be  a  preponderance  of  evidence 
in  order  to  convict. 

The  wretches  who  conduct  these  places  of  in- 
famy will  invariably  swear  falsely,  and  are  lost 
to  all  regard  for  truth.  It  is  with  great  difficulty 
that  convictions  are  obtained.  I  am  reminded 

of  a  case  we  brought  before  Judge  Y . 

The  woman  was  a  well  known  resort  keeper,  and 
had  quarters  in  an  elegant  apartment  building, 

which  was  owned  by  John  W. ,  a  man  of 

commercial    standing   in   the    community.     The 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

women  and  four  inmates  were  arrested  and 
brought  before  the  judge.  The  evidence  of  the 
prosecution  was,  in  effect,  that  the  habitation 
was  being  used  for  "immoral  purposes"  and  was 
so  conclusive  that  the  magistrate  stated  to  one  of 
the  defendants  that  he  knew  she  was  "lying,  ? 
but  turning  to  me  he  said,  "What  can  I  do?  The 
preponderance  of  evidence  is  against  you — Dis- 
charged!'* The  case  was  so  flagrant  that  the  in- 
spector of  the  district  said  to  me:  "111  have  her 
removed. "  And  he  kept  his  word. 

In  about  two  months  after  this  episode  we  had 
occasion  to  visit  the  same  apartment  building  on 
a  mission  of  the  same  character,  but  with  more 
favorable  results.  It  was  at  this  point  of  the 
proceedings  that  we  notified  the  owner  of  the 
building  that  papers  would  be  obtained  for  his 
arrest  should  we  discover  and  obtain  evidence  of 
further  violation  of  the  law  in  his  premises.  And 
so  the  work  moves  along.  We  find  that  a  "war- 
rant for  arrest"  is  a  good  educational  factor  for 
those  clever  devils  who  are  corrupt  themselves, 
and  who  bring  decent  men,  women  and  children 
within  the  environment  of  the  brothel  and  the 
influence  of  the  depraved.  The  weak  spots  of 


27 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

character  show  vividly  in  the  man  who  places 
money  above  honor  and  righteousness. 

The  investigator  comes  in  contact  with  many 
phases  of  metropolitan  life.  The  good  and  the 
bad,  the  dark  and  the  bright  side  is  flashed  be- 
fore his  constant  gaze.  "The  evil  men  do  live 
after  them,  the  good  is  oft  interred  with  their 
bones. "  Evil  is  always  present,  and  stands  out 
like  projecting  rocks  as  pitfalls  for  the  weak. 
The  saloon  and  the  dance  hall  are  twin  sisters 
in  crime,  and  the  common  root  of  immorality, 
disease  and  death ;  devouring  thousands  of  young 
men  and  women  annually.  The  bright  lights  and 
seductive  allurements  beckon  the  callous  youth, 
and  the  careless  maiden  to  a  swift  and  certain 
death,  and  in  anguish  they  lift  their  guilty 
voices  and  cry  out,  "Damned!  Damned 
Damned!'' 

With  all  the  force  and  power  at  my  command, 
I  denounce  the  saloon  and  the  dance  hall  as 
breeders  of  vice;  destructive  to  all  the  finer  in- 
stincts of  manhood  and  womanhood;  they  form 
the  very  gateway  that  leads  to  hell.  Fathers! 
look  to  your  sons !  Mothers  I  Look  to  your  daugh- 
ters! 


28 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

The  following  letter'  is  a  sample  of  many  which 
I  have  received : 

Mr.  Samuel  P.  Wilson, 

Chicago,  Illinois. 
Dear  Sir: 

Enclosed  find  the  address  of  a  man  and  woman 
who  run  a  flat  and  keep  women  in  it  for  immoral 

purposes.    The  house  number  is  36 —  East 

rd  Street,  and  the  telephone  No  is Drexel. 

You  can  call  the  woman  up  any  time,  and  make 
arrangements  to  call  on  her,  as  that  is  the  method 
they  use  in  getting  men  to  call.  I  live  in  the 
apartment  just  under  them,  and  they  are  a  nui- 
sance and  a  disgrace.  They  have  two  other  wom- 
en in  the  flat,  and  it  is  not  very  hard  to  pick  them 
out  for  what  they  are.  They  are  not  employed, 
for  I  have  frequently  seen  them  go  out  at  all 
hours  of  the  night,  and  also  seen  men  go  in  at 
different  times.  The  man  living  with  Mrs. 

B. passes  as  her  husband,  but  that  is  not 

true,  for  they  had  a  quarrel  not  long  ago,  and  I 
heard  her  deny  the  fact. 

I  hope  you  will  be  able  to  have  them  removed, 
for  it  is  disgraceful  to  live  in  a  building  with  this 


29 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

class.    I  have  called  the  agent's  attention  to  the 
matter,  but  he  has  not  sent  them  away. 

Wishing  you  success  in  the  work  you  are  do- 
ing, I  am,  Yours  very  truly, 

Mrs.  J. A.  Z . 

I  do  not  condemn  all  dance  houses,  or  dancing 
in  general,  but  the  contention  is,  however,  that 
those  where  liquor  is  served  without  regard  to 
age  or  sex  is  pernicious,  and  should  be  prohib- 
ited. A  web  is  often  woven  around  young  women 
which  ruins  their  lives.  The  young  man  takes 
his  first  glass,  and  fills  a  drunkard's  grave. 

What's  that!  You  don't  believe  it!  Then 
listen!  On  the  26th  of  January,  this  year,  my 
"rounds"  brought  me  to  a  well,  but  unfavorably 
known  dance  hall,  within  the  shadows  of  a  rich 
and  popular  church.  It  was  in  the  quiet  of  the 
night,  the  dance  was  on,  the  mazey  waltz  was  in 
full  swing.  Looking  about  the  large,  dimly 
lighted  hall,  I  saw  a  crowd  collected  in  one  cor- 
ner of  the  room  not  far  away.  Pushing  myself 
through  the  half  drunken  men  and  women,  I 
reached  the  desired  place  and  beheld  a  scene  re- 
volting to  my  manhood.  Lying  on  the  hard, 


30 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

wooden  floor  before  me,  was  the  form  of  a  little 
girl,  not  yet  sixteen,  stupefied  with,  drink,  and  her 
companion,  a  youth  of  probably  eighteen  years, 
in  a  condition  bordering  on  collapse.  Poor  child ! 
"With  a  terrible  oath  she  beseeched  those  about 
her  to  leave  her.  My  soul  was  borne  down  with 
a  heavy  weight.  I  could  scarcely  grasp  the  situ- 
ation all  at  once,  but  finally,  regaining  my  com- 
posure, I  lifted  the  child  to  her  feet,  and  placed 
her  in  a  chair.  The  brightness  of  her  eyes  had 
grown  dim,  every  muscle  of  her  frail  body  had 
relaxed  to  such  an  extent  that  it  was  necessary 
to  hold  her  in  a  sitting. position.  The  poor  girl 
was  then  left  with  her  companions  and  with  a 
weary,  sad  heart,  I  left  the  place.  I  called  the 
attention  of  the  lieutenant  of  the  district  to  the 
flagrant  violation  of  the  statutes  which  were  con- 
tinuialy  being  enacted  at  this  resort.  Oh!  You 
say,  "I  don't  believe  it."  Well,  take  a  peek  al- 
most any  night  into  one  of  the  dance  halls  where 
liquor  is  made  the  chief  source  of  revenue,  and 
the  terrible,  revolting  scene  enacted  there  will 
disabuse  your  mind  forever.  The  following,  and 
many  similar  letters  have  been  received  from 
mothers.  Read  it  carefully  and  reflect. 


31 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

34 East St., 

Chicago,  Feb.  26,  1910. 
Mr.  Samuel  P.  Wilson, 

Investigator  of  the  Douglas  Neighborhood  Club. 
Dear  Sir: 

Knowing  that  your  Association  has  been  of 
great  service  to  the  city,  I  am  going  to  ask  you  if 
you  can  do  something  to  help  a  heart-broken 
mother.  I  have  a  daughter,  not  yet  eighteen 
years  old,  who  frequents  the  cheap  dance  halls, 
and  I  seem  to  have  no  influence  over  her  at  all. 
Oh!  so  very  often  she  comes  home  in  an  intox- 
icated condition,  and  last  night  was  brought 
home  in  a  cab.  Cannot  something  be  done  with 
these  terrible  places  that  are  ruining  so  many 
of  our  girls  and  boys.  If  you  can  help  me,  the 
prayers  of  a  heart-broken  mother  will  follow  you 
through  life.  Oh!  I  have  prayed  so  often  that 
my  child  would  see  the  folly  of  it  all,  but  my  heart 
sinks  within  me,  and  I  know  I  am  powerless. 

I  am  asking  this  of  you  in  God's  name,  and  I 
hope  he  will  bless  you  in  the  great  work  you  are 
doing. 

Yours  very  truly, 

Mrs.  Jennie  L- 


32 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

These  places  are  frequented  by  all  classes  of 
society,  from  the  lowest  dregs,  to  men  and  women 
who  claim  respectability  and  occasionally  a  man 
and  his  family  are  seen  here.  The  visitors  are, 
however,  principally  young  men  and  boys.  Often 
the  hardened  prostitute  mingles  with  the  crowd, 
and  the  girl  of  tender  years  and  respectability 
joins  the  outcast  of  society  in  a  "social  glass." 
They  encourage  her  to  drink,  shamelessly  violate 
every  rule  of  propriety  and  she  indulges  in  liquor 
until  she  is  unable  to  protect  herself.  These 
dance  halls  are  often  handsome  places  and  flour- 
ish in  almost  every  quarter  of  the  city,  where  they 
flaunt  their  devil's  work  in  the  very  face  of  the 
better  class  of  citizens,  who  are  helpless  to  abate 
the  nuisance. 


The 
White  Slave  Traffic 

Throughout  the  United  States  the  White  Slave 
Traffic  is  assuming  appalling  proportions.  It  is 
wide-spread  and  even  international.  It  has  proved 
so  appalling  that  the  public  is  hardly  prepared, 
as  yet,  to  conceive  of  its  abnormal  extent. 

The  tremendous  and  disgraceful  facts  are 
these:  There  are  65,000  daughters  in  American 
homes,  and  15,000  alien  girls,  the  prey  each  year 
of  procurers  in  this  traffic,  according  to  authori- 
tative estimates.  Even  marriage  is  used  as  one 
of  the  diabolical  methods  of  capturing  girlhood 
and  young  womanhood  and  " breaking  them  in" 
to  a  life  of  shame. 

They  are  hunted  in  a  thousand  ways;  trapped, 
wing-broken,  sold — sold  for  less  than  swine — and 
held  in  white  slavery  ten  thousand  times  worse 
than  death. 

The  daughters  of  all  of  us,  our  sisters,  even 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

our  wives,  are  looked  upon  as  prey  for  the  white 
slave  traffic. 

There  must  be  some  practical  means  of  protect- 
ing our  girls;  the  monster  must  be  crushed  and 
the  country  in  general  forewarned. 

According  to  Clifford  G.  Roe,  there  is  from 
8,000  to  10,000  male  parasites  living  upon  money 
taken  in  by  the  25,000  or  30,000  women  of  evil 
lives  in  Chicago.  If  this  parasitism  could  be 
stopped,  these  men  would  lose  one  motive  for  lur- 
ing inexperienced  girls  into  the  white  slave  mar- 
ket. 

White  Slavery  has  become  a  systematized  busi- 
ness, gigantic  in  its  scope,  and  powerful  in  its 
operations.  It  is  claimed  by  judges  of  our  courts 
that  it  has  its  "Big  Chief "  and,  that  no  less  than 
$200,000.00  was  made  last  year  from  the  sale  of 
young  girls  into  a  life  of  shame. 

Judge  John  R.  Newcomer,  speaking  from  the 
platform,  recently  said: 

"Within  one  week  I  have  seven  different  let- 
ters from  fathers,  from  Madison,  Wisconsin,  on 
the  north,  to  Peoria,  Illinois,  on  the  south,  asking 
me  in  God's  name  to  do  something  to  help  them 
find  their  daughters  because  they  had  come  to 


36 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

Chicago  and  they  had  never  heard  from  them 
afterward. 

"If  you  mean  by  the  "White  Slave"  traffic, 
the  placing  of  young  girls  in  a  brothel  for  a 
price,  it  is  undoubtedly  a  real  fact,  based  upon 
statements  that  have  been  made  in  my  court  dur- 
ing the  past  three  months  by  defendants,  both 
men  and  women,  who  have  pleaded  guilty  to  the 
crime,  and  in  a  sense  it  is  both  interstate  and  in- 
ternational. ' ' 

The  selling  price  ranges  any  where  from  $15.00 
to  $500.00,  and  is  generally  based  upon  the  beauty 
of  the  "Slave." 

A  case  of  this  kind  is  vividly  pictured  in  my 
mind  as  I  write.  I  was  seated  at  the  dinner  table 
one  evening  when  the  telephone  rang.  My  oldest 
girl  (God  bless  and  protect  her)  answered  the 
summons.  The  message  was  for  myself,  and  as  she 
called  out,  "Papa!"  I  left  the  table  to  hear  what 
the  speaker  had  to  say. 

"Hello!  Is  this  Mr.  Wilson?"  "Yes."  "Well, 

Mr.  Wilson  Lieutenant  Z would  like  to 

have  you  call  and  see  him ! "  "All  right ;  when ? ' ' 
"About  7:30  this  evening,  if  you  can."  Stating 
to  him  that  I  would  call  and  see  the  lieutenant, 

n 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

I  hung  up  the  receiver.    After  finishing  my  din- 
ner I  made  my  way  to  the  office  of  the  officer  in 
question.    He  was  a  gruff  old  fellow,  but  true  as 
steel — and  to  his  credit,  be  it  said,  he  has  never 
failed  to  do  his  duty  as  an  officer. 
After  a  cordial  greeting,  he  said  to  me: 
"Mr.  Wilson,  I  am  suspicious  of  a  certain  wom- 
an living  at  number  31 Street.    I  believe 

her  to  be  a  White  Slave  dealer.  She  is  a  "foxy" 
woman,  and  my  men  do  not  seem  able  to  get  the 
evidence  against  her.  I  wish  you  would  see  what 
you  can  do." 

' 'All  right,  lieutenant,"  I  said,  "I  will  let  you 
know  what  progress  I  am  making  tomorrow," 
and  after  a  few  casual  remarks  departed. 

Leaving  the  lieutenant,  I  mounted  a  car  and 
called  at  the  house  in  question.  Giving  the  elec- 
tric button  a  hard  push,  I  heard  its  ring  and  also 
the  husky  growl  of  a  "man-eating"  bull  dog  on 
the  inside. 

The  "regulation  maid"  answered  the  bell,  and 
upon  making  inquiry  for  the  madame,  was  in- 
formed she  was  not  at  home.    "If  you  have  busi 
ness  with  her,  you'd  better  call  her  up  by  'phont 


38 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

all  her  business  is  done  that  way."  Telling  her 
I  would  do  so,  I  departed. 

The  next  day  at  eleven  o'clock  I  called  up  the 
woman  in  question  and  the  following  conversa- 
tion took  place : 

"Hello!  is  this  Madame  Bazarre?" 

"Yes,"  came  the  reply,  in  a  pleasing  voice. 

"Well,  Madame,  the  business  I  have  with  you 
is  a  peculiar  one,  and,  until  we  are  better  ac- 
quainted, I  do  not  want  my  name  known.  Do 
you  understand." 

"Yes,  that's  all  right,  what  is  it  you  want?" 

"I  understand  that  you  can  furnish  girls;  now 
I  have  a  friend  who  is  willing  to  buy  one  and, 
knowing  of  you,  I  thought  I  would  give  you  a 
show;  but,  you  know  this  is  a  "bad  business" 
and  I  want  to  know  whether  you  can  keep  your 
mouth  shut  or  not." 

"You  can  trust  me,  I  never  get  "cold  feet"; 
you  had  better  call  and  see  me  about  four  o'clock 
this  afternoon." 

Assuring  her  I  would,  I  closed  the  conversation 
and  waited  developments.  At  the  appointed 
hour  I  was  at  the  Madame 's  richly  furnished 
apartment.  We  were  not  long  in  getting  down 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

to  business.  Of  course  I  played  the  timid  "go 
between"  and  the  more  fear  I  exhibited,  the 
bolder  she  became.  The  "colder  my  feet,"  the 
more  communicative  and  confidential  "interest" 
she  showed  in  me. 

"Madam,  I  know  a  man  who  wants  to  buy  a 
girl.  Can  you  supply  one  ? "  I  said. 

"Oh,  yes!  I  can  furnish  twenty  of  them",  she 
answered  with  a  toss  of  her  head. 

"Are  you  quite  sure  that  we  will  not  be  found 
out?"  I  queried. 

"I  never  'squeal'  on  my  friends,  you  can  de- 
pend on  me,"  she  said. 

"What  do  you  charge  for  a  good  looking  girl, 
say  about  sixteen  or  eighteen  years  old?"  I  asked 
her. 

"I  have  a  very  pretty  girl  in  the  house  now, 
would  you  like  to  see  her?  I  will  let  you  have 
her  for  fifty  dollars.  She  would  please  any  man, ' ' 
she  said  with  a  knowing  wink. 

My  God,  I  thought,  as  she  vouchsafed  this  in- 
formation, suppose  this  female  devil  had  my  girl 
in  her  power.  The  desire  to  strangle  her  grew 
strong  within  me,  and  it  was  with  difficulty  that 
I  restrained  myself  from  clutching  her  by  the 


40 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

short,  thick  neck,  and  ridding  the  world  of  one 
of  its  worst  enemies.  Knowing,  however,  that  any 
act  or  word  of  mine  aside  from  the  part  of  "  play- 
ing the  villain "  would  spoil  the  object  of  my 
errand,  I  continued  the  conversation. 

"You  say  you  will  sell  this  girl  for  fifty  dol- 
lars !  Is  that  the  usual  price  ? ' ' 

"0,  no!  this  girl  is  very  pretty  and  young.  I 
can  let  you  see  other  girls  if  you  want  to  see 
them/' 

Assuring  her  that  I  thought  the  one  she  had  in 
view  would  suit  my  friend,  it  was  agreed  that 
I  should  bring  him  to  her  house  the  following  day, 
and  at  that  time  she  would  produce  the  girl. 
Reporting  the  progress  made  to  the  lieutenant  as 
previously  announced,  warrants  were  sworn  out 
for  the  arrest  of  the  woman,  who,  for  fifty  dol- 
lars, would  procure  and  sell  your  child  or  mine. 

There  is  an  endless  chain  of  detail  in  making 
an  arrest  of  this  kind.  It  is  necessary  to  allay 
any  suspicions  the  guilty  party  may  have,  every 
move  must  be  closely  guarded,  and,  when  the 
final  arrangements  are  made,  to  strike  with  a  de- 
cisive blow. 

The  outcome  of  the  episode  here  related  can 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

better  be  told  in  the  words  of  a  newspaper  clip- 
ping: 

"An  interesting  denoument  is  the  arrest  of 
Madame  Bazarre,  wife  of  a  former  police  officer 
from  down  the  state,  which  caused  a  sensation  on 
account  of  the  crusade  which  is  being  made  in 
Chicago  against  the  'white  slave'  traffic. 

"Mr.  Samuel  P.  "Wilson,  whose  coup  resulted  in 
the  womans*  arrest,  sat  in  his  office  with  a  smile 
of  satisfaction  on  his  face,  lay  back  in  his  arm 
chair  and  calmly  related  how  he  had  gone  to  the 
woman's  apartment  and  made  arrangements  to 
have  her  sell  a  girl  to  a  friend,  and  at  the  ap- 
pointed hour,  he  was  to  produce  the  buyer,  when 
the  Madame  would  produce  the  girl. 

"The  climax  resulted  in  the  arrest  of  the 
Madame  and  the  young  woman  after  $50.00  had 
been  paid  and  a  receipt  given  for  the  money. 

"The  two  men  who  are  investigators  for  the 
Douglas  Neighborhood  Club,  are  probably  the 
cleverest  in  their  line  in  the  city,  and  are  often 
called  upon  by  the  police  officials  to  do  special 
work  for  the  police  department." 


Law-Breaking  Druggists 

There  is  another  source  of  law-breaking  in  Chi- 
cago which  needs  summary  attention.  There  are 
many  proprietors  of  "so-called"  drug  stores  who 
are  engaged  in  the  illegal  sale  of  intoxicating 
drink,  and  carry  on  an  extensive  business  after 
the  closing  hours  of  the  saloons.  These  "stores" 
are  dangerous  to  any  community,  and  are  only 
so  many  "blind  pigs."  No  self-respecting  drug- 
gist will  sell  liquors  without  the  written  prescrip- 
tion of  a  doctor  of  established  reputation.  The 
wretches  who  for  gain  will  trample  the  law  in 
the  dust,  are  breeders  of  anarchy,  and  should  be 
treated  as  such  by  the  honest  men  in  that  busi- 
ness. They  establish  themselves  in  some  re- 
spectable neighborhood,  and  carry  on  a  thriving 
trade.  Gambling  is  indulged  in  to  a  greater  or 
less  degree  in  most  of  them,  and  it  is  no  uncom- 
mon sight  to  see  the  place  crowded  with  men  and 
women  waiting  for  the  "racing  form"  to  appear, 
hot  from  the  printing  press.  If  you  will  listen, 


43 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

you  will  hear  a  woman's  voice  ring  out  in  the 
dimly  lighted  room:  " Which  horse  won?  Did 
'Pony  Boy*  come  in  second?  That  horse  is  punk; 
I  lost  $4.00  on  him  yesterday. " 

The  officials  know  of  the  "  crooked "  work  go- 
ing on,  but  seem  powerless  tro  abate  the  nuisance. 
The  "all-night"  drug  store  should  be  classed  in 
the  same  category  as  the  saloon,  and  should  pay 
the  same  license  of  $1,000.  All  proprietors  of 
drug  stores  are  not  bad,  however,  and  they 
should  see  to  it  that  the  "  all-night-drug-store- 
saloon  "  cease  defying  the  law,  thus  bringing 
their  business  into  disrepute. 

In  substantiation  of  the  charge  made  against 
these  men,  I  recall  an  instance  where  I  was  sum- 
moned to  the  office  of  the  Chief  of  Police,  who  re- 
quested me  to  secure  the  evidence  against  a 
druggist  whom  he  believed  to  be  selling  liquor 
illegally.  Informing  me  of  the  location  of  the 
"store,"  I  made  my  way  to  the  vicinity  of  the 
place  in  question,  and  soon  found  the  Chief's  sus- 
picions were  well  founded.  It  was  now  midnight, 
and  knowing  that  the  opportune  time  would  be 
after  the  saloonkeepers  in  the  neighborhood  had 
"closed"  their  establishments,  I  awaited  until  the 


44 


CHICAGO  B7  GAS  LIGHT. 

hour-hand  of  a  large  clock  on  the  corner  pointed 
to  one  o'clock.  Soon  the  men  and  women  came 
pouring  out  into  the  dark  and  blustery  night. 
Several  of  them  repaired  to  the  place  in  question, 
and  were  conducted  to  the  "little  room"  back  of 
the  prescription  wall.  Upon  entering  the  place, 
I  was  met  by  a  portly,  smooth-faced  man,  who 
inquired : 

"Well,  sir,  what  can  I  do  for  you? 

"Cigars,  please,"  I  answered.  "Won't  you 
have  one,  also?" 

Gaining  his  confidence,  I  asked  him  for  "some- 
thing to  warm  me  up, ' '  it  being  very  cold  outside. 

"Certainly,  just  step  back  here/'  leading  the 
way  to  the  rear  of  the  store. 

There  were  several  men  and  women  drinking 
at  the  time;  some  were  drinking  beer  and  others 
whiskey.  The  women  were  those  of  the  under- 
world, and  had  little  regard  for  decency,  and 
were  admonished  several  times  by  the  man  in 
charge  to  cease  their  boisterous  laughter.  We 
had  ordered  beer,  and  were  about  to  be  served 
when  the  proprietor  came  rushing  toward  us  and 
said,  in  a  courteous  manner : 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

"Sorry,  gentlemen;  but  I  don't  know  you;  we 
don't  serve  drinks  here." 

"0,  get  out,"  I  said  to  him.  "What  do  you 
mean  by  that;  you  are  selling  both  whisky  and 
beer  to  the  other  guests,  and  why  do  you  refuse 
us?" 

"That  don't  make  any  difference  I  can't  serve 
you,"  he  replied. 

Being  assured  that  we  were  "good  fellows," 
he  finally  consented  to  sell  us  the  refreshment 
sought.  Before  leaving  the  place  we  were  able 
to  buy  all  we  desired. 

Purchasing  a  bottle  of  whiskey  for  future  evi- 
dence, I  left  the  place,  in  company  with  the  man 
I  took  along  as  a  corroberative  witness,  which  is 
a  necessary  adjunct,  if  a  conviction  is  wanted. 
These  men  are  scoundrels  by  nature,  and  do  not 
hesitate  to  swear  falsely  when  occasion  requires 
it,  or  when  they  are  benefited  by  committing  the 
crime. 

I  made  a  report  to  the  Chief,  and  presented  the 
bottle  of  whiskey  I  had  previously  purchased  to 
him  to  be  used  as  conclusive  evidence  should  it 
be  needed;  I  was  personally  thanked  by  him  for 
the  promptness  with  which  I  secured  the  evi- 


46 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

dence,  and  with  a  feeling  of  satisfaction  that  I 
had  at  least  done  my  duty  as  a  citizen,  I  left  him. 
Our  actions  are  our  own.  We  give  advice,  bnt 
cannot  give  the  wisdom  to  profit  by  it.  I  hope 
I  shall  always  possess  firmness  and  virtue  enough 
to  maintain  what  I  consider  the  most  enviable  of 
all  titles,  that  of  an  honest  man. 


Gambling  in  Chicago 

Gambling  flourishes  in  Chicago  despite  the  com- 
bined efforts  of  the  newspapers  and  the  police. 
The  great  metropolitan  journals  wield  a  tremen- 
dous influence  upon  the  officers,  stimulating  them, 
and  pushing  them  on  to  intelligent  action.  In 
late  years  the  laws  against  gambling  have  been 
enforced  more  rigidly  than  formerly,  and  the 
number  of  professional  gamblers  has  somewhat 
diminished,  yet  there  are  enough  of  them  left  to 
make  their  business  a  very  marked  feature  of 
metropolitan  life.  "The  good  old  days"  of  the 
gambling  fraternity  has  passed  away,  and  there 
is  nothing  left  but  the  scattered  fragments  of  the 
"poor  man's"  game. 

There  may  be  isolated  houses  where  roulet, 
faro  and  the  gentleman's  game  of  poker  is  in- 
dulged in,  but  if  so,  I  have  no  knowledge  of  it. 
The  daily  papers  have  been  largely  responsible 
for  their  closing.  The  chief  pastime  of  the  "gen- 
tlemen of  leisure"  is  now  confined  to  lowly 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

games  of  bridge  whist  and  such.  Bookmaking 
is,  however,  largely  indulged  in,  despite  the  com- 
bined efforts  of  the  editors  and  the  police  the 
evil  continues. 

It  was  during  an  aldermanic  campaign,  not 
long  since,  that  I  was  requested  by  an  officer  of 
our  association  to  collect  evidence  against  a  sa- 
loonkeeper who  was  supposed  to  be  running  a 
"  hand-book. " 

In  company  with  another  gentleman,  we  start- 
ed in  quest  of  the  desired  evidence.  Arriving  at 
the  "saloon,"  we  made  an  inspection  of  the  place, 
and  found  several  rooms  connected  with  the  es- 
tablishment, and  men  going  in  and  out  of  some 
of  them.  At  one  of  the  doors  we  noticed  a  man 
was  in  attendance  who  admitted  only  those  that 
were  known  to  him.  We  formed  the  acquaintance 
of  a  man  who  was  repairing  the  flooring  in  an 
adjoining  room,  and  removing  my  overcoat,  I 
proceeded  to  help  him  do  some  of  the  work,  be- 
lieving that  in  that  way  I  could  ingratiate  myself 
into  their  favor,  and  gain  an  entrance  into  the 
room  where  the  "lookout"  was  stationed.  I 
worked  away  with  a  cheerful  spirit  until  I  learn- 
ed that  it  was  necessary  to  know  the  password 


50 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

or  the  knowing  "wink"  which  the  habitues 
of  the  place  were  compelled  to  give.  So  closely 
guarded  is  the  business,  that  it  is  almost  impossi- 
ble for  a  stranger  to  obtain  entrance  into  a  gam- 
bling house  in  Chicago.  I  notified  the  police,  and 
a  few  days  later  the  house  was  raided. 

Gambling  is  more  prevalent  at  election  time 
than  any  other  period,  owing  to  the  fact  that 
politicians — the  office-holding  politicians — will  al- 
low many  privileges  while  seeking  votes, 
that  they  would  spurn,  once  they  are  safely  land 
sd  in  a  well  paying  position. 


51 


Bath  and  Massage  Rooms 

In  the  Turkish  bath  rooms  a  very  disreputable 
business  is  extensively  carried  on  in  Chicago,  and 
has  been  for  many  years.  These  "rooms"  are 
scattered  all  over  the  city,  and  are  chiefly  oper- 
ated by  unscrupulous  women.  They  are  only  so 
many  places  where  immorality  is  conducted.  Of 
course  there  are  numerous  bath  houses  that  are 
run  on  business  principles,  and  are  safe  and  free 
from  demoralizing  influences,  and  are  operated 
by  men  and  frequented  by  that  sex.  They  are  a 
necessity,  and  with  the  proper  sanitary  precau- 
tions, are  to  be  encouraged.  The  improper  places 
are  those  conducted  by  women,  and  which  have 
women  attendants.  These  places  are  "baths"  in 
name  only.  They  are  houses  of  prostitution  and 
keep  women  for  immoral  purposes.  Take  up  a 
paper  most  any  day,  and  you  will  read  of  some 
woman  who  has  been  arrested  and  fined  for  keep- 
ing a  "disorderly  bath  room."  Only  recently,  in 
the  very  heart  of  the  city,  a  woman  was  arrested 


53 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

for  harboring  girls  under  age  in  her  "bath  room" 
resort. 

Not  long  since  my  business  took  me  to  the  place 

owned  by  Mrs.  at  43 Street.  The 

place  had  been  previously  "tipped  off"  to  me, 
and  was  supposed  by  the  people  in  the  neighbor- 
hood to  be  properly  conducted.  Calling  at  the 
house  in  question,  I  pushed  the  electric  button 
and  waited  for  a  response.  My  informant  had 
given  me  the  right  information,  and  imagine  my 
surprise  when  the  door  was  opened  and  a  pre- 
possessing woman,  perhaps  20  years  old,  met  me 
in  an  almost  nude  condition.  I  was  admitted  and 
at  once  inquired  for  the  proprietor.  Being  in- 
formed that  she  was  engaged  at  that  moment,  but 
would  soon  be  "free,"  I  concluded  to  wait,  and 
gained  much  information  from  the  young  woman 
who  admitted  me.  There  were  six  "baths"  in 
this  establishment,  each  "stall"  being  handsome- 
ly curtained  off,  making  separate  rooms,  which 
were  presided  over  by  a  woman. 

God  pity  the  countryman,  or  the  intoxicated 
man  that  happens  to  fall  into  the  clutches  of  the 
proprietors  who  run  one  of  these  places.  Theft 
is  ~ften  resorted  to  in  order  to  gain  money,  anu 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

many  a  "poor  devil "  has  been  found  in  the  alley, 
or  wandering  hopelessly  in  the  streets,  after  be- 
ing robbed  in  one  of  these  pest-holes. 

The  police  know  of  these  indecent  "rooms"  but 
make  no  attempt  to  drive  them  out  of  business. 
Arrests  are  made,  and  sometimes  fines  are  paid, 
but  the  owners  continue  to  do  business  in  the 
same  old  way,  and  at  the  same  old  stand,  and  it 
may  be  as  a  proprietor  once  said  to  me : 

"0,  the  police  will  not  bother  me;  why,  they 
take  'baths'  here!" 


The 
Department  Store  Evil 

The  department  store  is  a  curse  to  the  conn, 
try,  and  do  more  injury  to  society  than  all  other 
business  establishments  combined.  They  are 
breeders  of  discontent  and  a  line  of  demarcation 
between  the  home  and  the  brothel.  In  most  in- 
stances the  wages  paid  are  insufficient  to  main- 
tain existence,  and  the  majority  of  the  workers 
are  compelled  by  dire  necessity  to  seek  some  other 
method  of  livlihood  in  order  to  save  themselves 
from  starvation.  Many  instances  have  oft  been 
told  where  women  have  resorted  to  prostitution 
and  theft  to  obtain  that  which  God  has  given  all 
a  right  to — a  decent  living. 

The  women  employed  back  of  the  counters  in 
a  department  store  are  paid  $5.00  to  $7.00  per 
week.  The  Young  Woman's  Christian  Associa 
tion,  a  so-called  benevolent  organization,  chargea 
$5.25  for  a  room  and  board,  two  persons  in  a 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

room,  and  to  figure  out  where  the  saleswoman 
can  maintain  herself  and  her  honor  on  that  sum, 
is,  indeed,  beyond  ordinary  comprehension. 
There  is  small  chance  for  her  existence,  and  the 
cause  of  her  terrible  sufferings  should  be  stripped 
of  everything  which  has  distinguished  it  for  its 
demoralizing  influence.  I  cannot  dig  into  the  root 
of  the  evil,  but  I  can  denounce  in  vehement  terms 
the  rich  rascals  who  own  these  great  commercial 
institutions,  who  pay  a  wage  to  the  workers 
which  condemns  them  to  a  living  hell.  "Were  I 
in  the  legislature,  one  of  my  first  acts  would  be 
to  have  a  bill  passed,  compelling  these  monsters 
to  pay  living  wages  to  their  help. 

Another  despicable  feature  of  the  department 
store  is  the  number  of  young  girls  they  employ. 
Many  of  them  are  scarcely  in  their  teens.  They 
are  continually  thrown  into  the  maelstrom  of  the 
underworld.  They  are  obliged  to  wait  upon  and 
talk  to  "the  painted  women  of  the  town."  The 
demoralizing  influence  is  often  very  great,  and 
the  way  is  made  easier  for  the  procurers  who 
abound  in  all  institutions  where  a  great  number 
of  women  are  congregated.  These  poor,  pale,  un- 
der-paid girls  are  weaklings  in  the  hands  of  the 


58 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

moral '  *  outcast, ' '  who  come  to  them  with  tales  of 
wealth,  luxury  and  an  easy  life.  Thousands  of 
girls  every  year  are  being  led  into  lives  of  shame 
by  reason  of  the  environments  encountered. 

If  conditions  were  such  that  the  young  women 
employed  in  the  great  retail  emporiums  of  our 
city  could  have  reasonable  recreation  and  suf- 
ficient remuneration  for  services  rendered  they 
would  not  choose  the  road  that  leads  straight  to 
hell.  For  these  poor  souls,  there  is  scarcely  a 
blush.  They  are  drawn  to  the  market  and  sold 
as  the  brute  for  gold.  It  is  a  serious  business, 
and  some  day  will  call  forth  loud  protests  from 
the  press  and  pulpit  of  the  land.  The  open  battle 
is  on ;  the  merchant  prince  is  victor  so  far,  and  we 
can  only  hope  that  eventually  justice  will  pre- 
vail. 

There  are  many  damaging  stories  told  about 
unscrupulous  managers  of  these  department 
stores,  and  if  true,  the  rascals  should  be  brought 
to  swift  punishment.  The  young  woman  in  ques^ 
tion  was  a  sweet-faced  girl,  eighteen  years  old, 
and  from  a  small  town  in  southern  Illinois.  She 
was  just  out  of  school  and  knew  nothing  of  the 
ways  of  the  world.  Her  father  had  recently  died, 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

leaving  her  the  main  support  of  the  little  family, 
consisting  of  herself,  mother  and  two  younger 
sisters.  Knowing  of  the  great  department  stores 
here,  she  left  her  home  and  came  to  Chicago  with 
expectations  of  finding  employment  and  of  being 
a  great  help  to  her  mother.  Arriving  here  she 
went  with  all  haste  to  one  of  the  "big"  stores  and 
made  application  for  employment,  and  was  told 
that  work  would  be  given  her.  She  was  overcome 
with  joy  at  the  prospect  of  being  able  to  send 
home  a  substantial  sum  each  week,  and  make 
glad  the  hearts  of  the  loved  ones  there.  Upon 
making  inquiry  as  to  the  amount  of  salary  she 
would  receive,  was  told  that  she  would  be  given 
the  munificent  amount  of  $5.00  per  week.  As 
she  realized  what  this  meant  to  her,  her  heart 
sank  low,  and  tears  dimmed  her  eyes. 

Recovering  herself,  she  said  to  the  manager: 
"I  am  afraid  I  cannot  work  for  so  small  a  sum;  I 
am  obliged  to  pay  my  board,  and  that  would  not 
support  me."  His  answer  to  this  appeal  is  indeed 
shocking,  and  should  arouse  the  indignation  of 
every  father  and  mother,  and  bring  them  to  a 
realization  of  the  dangers  their  daughters  are 
subjected  to.  This  brazen  rascal  had  the  effront- 


60 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

ery  to  ask  her  if  she  did  not  have  "some  'friend1 
on  the  outside  who  would  help  her." 

Her  face  flushed.    She  saw  the  point,  and  tun* 
ing,  left  him  without  another  word. 


The  Ice  Cream  Joints. 

Much  damage  is  being  done  to  the  morals  of 
young  boys  and  girls  in  the  confectionery  stores 
operated  by  foreigners.  In  every  quarter  of  the 
city  you  will  see  a  sign  reading  similar  to  the 
following:  "Pizzaza  Popupka's  Ice  Cream  Par- 
lor. "  The  men  who  own  the  " joints'*  are  as  a 
rule  rascals,  and  stop  at  nothing  short  of  murder 
to  gain  wealth.  Every  trick  that  is  known  to 
the  dishonest  merchant  is  to  them  a  welcome  art, 
and  they  grow  rich  upon  money  secured  from 
strangers  in  the  city  who  are  at  the  mercy  of  the 
wretches.  These  men  break  the  law  continually, 
and  have  no  conception  of  moral  decency.  They 
are  often  brought  before  the  court  for  infringe- 
ment of  the  sanitary  statutes. 

Some  of  the  more  unscrupulous  men  have  "pri- 
vate quarters ' '  for  the  accommodation  of  the  boys 
and  girls,  and  it  is  no  uncommon  sight  to  see 
these  young  people  carousing  in  them  in  an  inde- 


63 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

cent  manner.  Many  arrests  have  been  made  and 
fines  collected,  but  the  disreputable  features  are 
not  eliminated  and  the  rascally  business  contin- 
ues to  flourish. 

The  majority  of  the  "  joints "  are  owned  by 
Greeks,  though  many  Italians,  Englishmen,  Irish- 
men and  even  Americans  are  engaged  in  the  busi- 
ness. The  most  rascally,  however,  are  the  Greeks. 
The  worst  feature  of  their  business  is  in  the  entic- 
ing of  young  girls  into  their  rooms.  Many  cases 
have  been  reported  to  the  police  where  young  and 
innocent  girls  have  been  ruined.  They  do  not 
stop  at  that,  however,  and  often  little  children 
have  been  literally  torn  to  pieces  by  their  das- 
tardly practices.  The  law  should  be  built  around 
these  wretches  in  some  strong  and  powerful  man- 
ner that  would  compel  them  to  obey  its  injunction. 

Not  long  since  my  attention  was  called  to  a 

place  of  this  character  at  the  corner  of 

Avenue  and st  Street.  I  called  at  the  place 

in  question  on  a  Saturday  night  in  company  with 
another  gentleman,  and  the  sight  that  I  saw 
staggered  me,  and  a  description  of  the  scene 
would  scarcely  be  believed  by  the  reader.  There 


64 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

they  were !  count  them !  twos  and  fours ;  all  min- 
gled together  in  a  riotous  encounter. 

I  was  at  a  loss  at  first  to  account  for  the  disor- 
der, and  looked  at  the  gentleman  who  was  with 
me  in  a  dazed  sort  of  way,  and  asked  him  what 
he  thought  of  the  sight.  "This  is  hell,  only  a 
little  more  so/*  he  answered. 

I  then  endeavored  to  find  the  cause  of  so  much 
disorder.  Seating  myself  in  a  distant  corner  of 
the  room,  I  was  soon  approached  by  a  low-browed 
individual,  who  inquired: 

"Wot  hav?" 

I  had  previously  noticed  that  most  of  those 
present  were  being  served  with  liquid  refresh- 
ments, and  at  once  came  to  the  conclusion  that  our 
Greek  friend  was  doing  a  * '  crooked  business. ' '  I 
answered  him  by  saying : 

"Bring  me  the  same  drink  they  have  at  the  next 
table. " 

He  disappeared;  and  in  another  moment  re- 
turned with  the  drink  I  had  ordered.  Well,  when 
my  friend  and  I  had  tasted  the  contents  of  the 
fancy  shaped  glass,  our  surprise  was  complete, 
for  the  liquid  was  pretty  near  the  "real  thing/' 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

and  probably  was  about  80  per  cent  alcohol.  This 
was  the  interpretation  of  the  disorder  which  was 
a  nightly  occurrence  at  the  "  Greek  Ice  Cream 
Parlor." 

He  was  promptly  reported  to  the  police,  and  his 
place  was  closed  within  twenty-four  hours, 


Automobile  Riding 

Automobiling  is  becoming  a  dangerous  thing 
in  Chicago  in  more  ways  than  one.  It  is  called 
"joy  riding"  by  the  newspapers,  and  has  been 
given  this  peculiar  name  because  of  the  class  of 
men  and  women  who  abuse  the  pastime  by  all- 
night  drunken  carousals.  It  is  becoming  a  posi- 
tively dangerous  enjoyment  to  both  life  and  mor- 
als in  the  city.  Hardly  a  day  passes  that  some 
person  is  not  run  down  and  maimed  or  killed  by 
the  half-drunken  chauffers  and  even  worse  pas- 
sengers. The  city  ordinance  restricts  the  speed 
of  vehicles,  and  especially  that  of  these  powerful 
engines,  but  the  irresponsible  persons  handling 
them  have,  apparently,  no  regard  for  life  or  law. 
Many  of  the  drivers  are  inveterate  cigarette  smok- 
ers and  are  half -crazed  in  consequence. 

The  passengers  are  usually  men  of  no  standing 
in  the  community  and  the  women  are  either  semi- 
prostitutes  or  professional  harlots.  Often  you 
will  find  the  wife  of  some  hard-working  man 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

among  the  crowd,  and  many  homes  are  broken  up 
by  the  too  frequent  "joy  ride." 

This  feature  of  automobile  riding  is  becoming 
a  nuisance  and  a  disgrace  to  those  who  indulge 
in  it.  It  is  attracting  the  attention  of  the  author- 
ities, though  they  seem  incapable  of  restricting 
the  nuisance.  Step  to  your  phone  almost  any  time 
of  the  day  or  night  and  you  will,  if  you  listen, 
hear  some  man  or  woman  making  a  clandestine 
appointment,  in  which  the  "joy  ride"  is  made  the 
subject  of  conversation. 

It  is  impossible  to  estimate  the  amount  of 
drunkenness  that  is  caused  from  this  condition. 
It  is  very  large,  however,  and  is  assuming  larger 
proportions  every  day.  The  "joy  rides"  often 
stopping  at  as  many  as  twenty  "saloons"  in  the 
course  of  one  night.  The  "ride"  usually  ends 
up  in  a  drunken  debauch  or  at  some  police  sta- 
tion. 

Time  and  again  have  young  girls  been  rescued 
from  the  wretches  who  are  continually  on  the 
lookout  for  recruits  to  fill  the  ever-waiting  dens 
of  vice,  Only  recently  a  case  of  this  character 
was  reported  to  the  police  and  arrests  made.  It 
happened  that  a  very  attractive  girl,  not  yet  out 


68 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 


of  her  tec~o;  met  a  young  man  and  was  invited  to 
take  a  ride.  She  accepted  the  invitation  without 
a  suspicion  of  the  terrible  consequences.  After 
being  whirled  through  the  streets  and  boulevards 
for  some  time,  and  becoming,  as  she  thought,  bet- 
ter acquainted  with  the  man,  was  invited  to  have 
some  refreshments  in  one  of  the  numerous  road- 
houses  with  which  the  city  abounds.  This  proved 
to  be  her  undoing.  The  wretch  who  inticed  hei 
to  take  a  ride,  bought  and  drugged  the  drink  he 
gave  her;  deliberately  afterward  drove  to  the 
"  levee"  and  unloading  his  human  freight,  col- 
lected his  price,  and  drove  away.  The  young 
woman  was  horror  stricken  when  she  recovered 
from  the  drug,  and  demanding  her  release,  re- 
ported the  occurrence  to  the  police.  This  is  but 
one  of  the  many  similar  cases  which  are  being  re- 
ported continually. 


The  Amusement  Evil 

The  amusement  evil  in  Chicago  is  becoming 
alarmingly  great.  The  big  and  the  little  theatres 
flaunt  their  cheap,  vile  performances  before  the 
public  in  a  way  that  would  not  be  tolerated  in  a 
well  governed  city.  Examples  of  vulgarity  are 
the  "drawing  card"  and  the  immoral  imbeciles 
who  attend  the  so-called  plays  are  to  a  great  ex- 
tent to  be  blamed  for  much  of  the  degeneracy 
portrayed  in  the  show  houses. 

These  performances  are  not  only  attended  by 
the  low-browed,  pimpled-faced,  cigarette-smoking 
gentry,  but  often  by  mothers  and  wives  and 
women  in  "  society. "  You  will  also  see  the  gum- 
chewing  girls  there  in  great  numbers,  who  seem 
to  take  pride  in  acting  in  a  masculine  way,  that 
is  admired  by  a  dull,  putrid  and  licentious  type. 

The  newspapers  have  had  much  to  say  about  the 
"blood-and-thunder"  "five-cent"  shows,  and  have 
no  doubt  spoken  truthfully,  but  I  venture  to  say, 
that  more  harm  is  done  the  morals  of  the  com- 


71 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

munity  in  one  week  by  performances  of  shows 
bearing  the  head-lines  of  "Get  Busy  With  Emily/' 
than  all  the  five-cent  shows  combined.  The  au- 
thorities should  rid  the  city  of  these  vice-breeding- 
house-  of-prostitution-advertising--show-houses. 
The  shame  of  it,  however,  falls  equally  on  the 
patrons  of  the  place.  The  managers  would  not 
produce  the  vile,  coarse,  indecent  entertainments, 
if  it  were  not  for  the  coarse,  ignorant,  brain-lack- 
ing men  and  women  who  go  to  them  with  their 
mouths  wide  open,  ready  to  gulp  down  every 
word  pertaining  to  licentious  degeneracy. 

"Get  Busy  With  Emily. "  Isn't  that  a  picture 
for  you!  0,  you  praying  fathers  and  mothers; 
how  many  of  you  have  witnessed  the  performance 
of  this  nasty,  suggestive,  pig-pen  show?  How 
about  your  Emily,  Mary  or  Martha,  who  is  being 
dragged  down  by  these  immoral  shows  ?  It  should 
be  "Get  Busy  with  Your  City  Officers." 


Sweet  Charity 

In  our  work  as  an  investigator  we  have  been 
asked  many  times  what  we  do  with  the  young 
women  who  come  to  Chicago  seeking  employ- 
ment and  who  have  no  safe  place  of  abode.  Our 
answer  is  generally  unsatisfactory,  and  we  con- 
fess to  them  that  the  outlook  is  discouraging.  All 
the  talk  about  good  homes  for  the  working- 
woman  at  small  cost,  is  bosh,  and  the  public 
should  not  deceive  itself.  The  grand  ladies  of 
our  Lake  Shore  Drive  and  other  fashionable 
boulevards,  may  fuss  and  fume  about  the  "poor 
working  girl,"  but  I  have  yet  to  find  any  practical 
result  of  their  solicitude.  "It  is  true  we  have 
the  Young  Women's  Christian  Association,  which 
makes  some  pretention  to  lighten  the  burden  of 
a  great  number  of  our  working  girls,  but  upon 
investigation  it  is  found  that  this  institution  is 
maintained  for  gain.  As  heartless  as  it  may  seem, 
the  boarders  are  required  to  pay  from  $5.00  to 
$7.00  per  week  for  ordinary  board,  and  the  tran- 


73 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

sient  from  $8.00  to  $12.00  per  week.  If  there  is 
one  spark  of  benevolence  connected  with  the 
prices  charged  by  this  branch  of  the  so-called 
Christian  Association,  it  does  not  impress  itself 
very  forcibly  upon  the  average  man  or  woman. 

It's  all  for  gain.  The  fashionably  attired  ladies 
are  not  working  for  "glory,"  it's  the  "coin  that 
there  is  in  it."  They  act  with  their  eyes  "open," 
and  apparently  with  genuine  business  motives. 


74 


The  Cigarette  Evil 

Many  minds  and  bodies  are  being  ruined  by  the 
use  of  the  "deadly  cigarette."  It  is  unmistaka- 
bly next  to  the  drink  habit  so  far  as  mental  and 
bodily  harm  is  concerned.  The  evil  is  assuming 
startling  proportions  among  both  sexes.  Men  and 
women  of  all  stations  of  life,  the  good  and  the 
bad  have  acquired  the  habit  of  over-indulgence  in 
their  use.  The  evil  is  not  confined  to  the  inmates 
and  frequenters  of  the  brothel,  as  it  is  generally 
supposed  to  be,  but  is  found  in  the  homes  of  peo- 
ple of  refined  tastes,  and  is  blighting  the  lives  of 
our  society  women  and  their  daughters.  Even 
ministers  of  the  gospel  are  addicted  to  the  bain- 
ful  and  dangerous  habit.  The  evil  is  becoming 
alarmingly  great,  and  men  have  been  known  to 
die  horrible  deaths  from  this  cause  alone,  and  still 
there  is  no  hand  raised  to  stay  the  ravages  of  this 
abominable  nuisance.  It  is  true  there  has  been 
a  special  law  passed  regulating  the  sale  of  cigar- 
ettes, but  it  is  not  properly  enforced  and  is  to  m 


76 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

large  extent  a  dead  letter.  Boys  of  any  age  can 
buy  "the  makings."  Many  disreputable  drug- 
gists go  so  far  as  to  advertise  the  sale  of  cigar- 
ettes and  make  a  specialty  of  them  for  the  accom- 
modation of  their  women  patrons.  Of  course 
almost  every  cigar  store  handles  them  and  it  is 
doubtful  if  the  special  license  is  collected  with 
any  degree  of  accuracy. 

It  is  a  notorious  fact  that  some  of  our  finest 
homes  on  the  avenues  and  boulevards  teem  with 
the  nauseating  fumes  of  the  nasty-smelling  cigar- 
ette, and  both  men  and  women  of  the  household 
use  them  with  a  boldness  that  shocks  the  modest 
man  or  woman. 

The  women  who  smoke  cigarettes  do  so  with 
the  knowledge  that  it  is  a  reproach  to  their  char- 
acter, and  it  is  astonishing  to  know  how  they 
maintain  their  positions  in  society.  They  are  very 
numerous,  however,  and  the  evil  which  has  fas- 
tened its  deadly  grip  upon  them  they  are  power- 
less to  shake  off. 

As  to  the  young  men  and  boys  who  use  cigar- 
ettes, it  has  become  a  dreadful  disease,  and  is  the 
cause  of  much  crime,  some  even  becoming  raving 
maniacs  through  excessive  use  of  them.  Othera 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

lose  all  sense  of  honor  and  decency,  becoming 
absolute  slaves  to  the  habit,  and  will  lie,  steal, 
and  even  sell  the  clothing  off  their  backs  in  order 
to  procure  the  narcotic  to  appease  their  nervous 
condition. 

In  the  business  world  the  inveterate  cigarette 
smoker  is  looked  upon  as  a  nuisance  and  many 
firms  will  not  employ  one  if  they  detect  the  habit 
in  time. 

The  evil  is  next  to  the  drink  habit  and  some 
stringent  means  should  be  devised  to  stop  the  ter- 
rible havoc  that  is  being  wrought  among  the  men 
and  women  of  our  land. 


77 


Chop  Suey  Joints 

The  Chinaman  may  be  a  stranger  and  a  waif  in 
a  great  city,  but  he  has  managed  to  establish  him- 
self in  the  chop  suey  business  here.  They  do  not 
monopolize  the  business,  however,  for  the  wily 
Jap  is  always  ready  to  take  hold  of  a  "good 
thing."  It  is  amazing  to  see  the  number  of  young 
women  who  frequent  these  places,  and  become 
surprisingly  intimate  with  the  men  connected  with 
the  place.  These  restaurants  are  usually  elabor- 
ately furnished  in  the  style  peculiar  to  our  al- 
mond-eyed brother  and  lends  a  weird  and  fantas 
tic  aspect  to  the  surroundings. 

It  is  not  all  gold  that  glitters/'  however,  and 
"behind  the  scenes "  many  startling  tragedies  and 
revolting  crimes  are  enacted.  Almost  all  of  these 
"  joints "  employ  white  girls  to  do  the  kitchen 
work,  and  time  and  again  the  city  has  been 
aroused  by  the  atrocious  crime  committed  upon 
some  fair-faced  girl.  Arrests  are  made,  the  guilty 
one  punished,  but  still  the  doors  remain  open,  and 


79 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

the  proprietors  grow  rich  from  their  white  pa- 
trons. 

Not  many  weeks  have  passed  since  startling  dis- 
closures were  made  in  one  of  these  "  joints."  In 
a  separate  room  a  young  German  girl  was  found 
dead.  She  was  horribly  mutilated,  and  evidence 
was  produced  to  prove  she  had  been  drugged,  and 
ravished,  and  that  no  less  than  twenty  men  had 
visited  the  apartment  during  the  course  of  the 
night. 

A  great  many  people  are  skeptical  and  doubt 
the  truth  of  these  revolting  disclosures ;  however, 
if  these  same  people  will  visit  the  police  courts  in 
Chicago,  their  minds  will  be  disabused  of  the  fact 
that  many  of  these  places  are  bad  and  should  be 
placed  under  special  restrictions. 


80 


The 
Story  of  Lena  Murphy 

This  little  book  would  not  be  complete  did  it 
not  contain  an  account  of  poor  Lena  Murphy.  In 
the  long  roll  of  anti-Christian  acts  there  is  no 
blacker  record  than  that  which  deals  with  the  lost 
women  of  our  streets.  Nothing  can  exceed  in  re- 
volting injustice  the  conventional  mode  of  treat- 
ing the  weaker  and  the  most  tempted  as  a  moral 
leper,  while  her  guiltier  partner  occupies  the 
highest  places  in  the  synagogue. 

Justice  is  at  least  as  holy  a  thing  as  charity  and 
the  injustice  of  the  world's  judgment  which  the 
Church  has  countersigned  is  as  loathsome  as  the 
selfish  immorality  of  the  man  which  it  condones 
as  a  kind  of  offset  to  the  severity  with  which  it 
avenges  the  faults  of  the  weaker  sinner. 

The  lost  women,  these  poor  sisters  of  Christ,  the 
images  in  which  we  have  fashioned  a  womanhood 
first  made  in  the  image  of  God,  are  as  numerous 
in  Chicago  as  in  any  other  great  city.  The  silent 


81 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

vice  of  capitols  abounds  here  at  least  to  the  same 
extent  that  it  prevails  in  other  cities  of  the  mil- 
lion class.  The  regulars  of  the  army  of  vice  con- 
stitute the  solid  core  or  neuclus  of  a  host  far 
more  numerous  of  irregulars,  who,  either  from 
the  love  of  license  or  from  the  needs  of  money, 
give  way  to  temptation  which  is  always  at  hand. 
The  inmates  of  "houses,"  are  probably  not  one- 
tenth  of  the  total  number  of  women  who  regard 
their  sex  as  legitimate  merchandise. 

Both  "houses"  and  "roomers"  may  be  found 
in  all  parts  of  the  city.  From  the  business  sec- 
tion back  to  the  grand  trees  of  the  suburbs.  But 
there  is  no  section  in  which  they  are  so  concen- 
trated as  in  the  "Red  Light"  district.  It  was 
there  in  the  hot-bed  of  unrighteousness  that  I 
found  Lena  Murphy  in  the  house  of  Madame 
Leroque. 

Madame  Leroque  is  a  familiar  figure  in  the  alsa- 
tia  of  more  than  one  city.  She  is  famous  in  the 
Chicago  courts  as  having  been  defendant  in  aiany 
cases  of  wrongdoing.  Her  career  is  known  by  the 
police  from  coast  to  coast,  and  she  has  plied  her 
calling  in  many  of  the  large  cities  of  the  country. 

It  was  after  a  "raid"  that  I  made  Lena  Mur- 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

phy's  acquaintance.  I  was  making  my  rounds, 
and  stung  by  the  cold  winds  that  swept  the 
streets  bare  of  dust  and  refuse,  I  entered  a  neigh- 
boring  saloon.  Seating  myself  at  a  nearby  table 
I  was  soon  approached  by  the  person  whom  I  call 
Lena  Murphy.  Lena  was  flushed,  and  somewhat 
forward ;  both  her  eyes  were  discolored,  the  result 
of  a  fight  with  a  French  inmate  of  the  "house" 
adjoining  the  saloon. 

"I  don't  want  anything, "  I  said  to  Lena. 
"Why  can't  you  talk  decently  once  in  a  while? 
Sit  down  and  let  us  have  a  good  talk." 

Lena  looked  at  me  half  incredulously,  and  then 
sat  down. 

"Why  don't  you  leave  this  life?"  I  said  to  her. 
She  did  not  answer. 

"Are  you  not  tired  of  it  all,  have  you  not  drunk 
to  the  bottom  of  your  cup?"  A  dreamy  look 
came  over  her  face. 

Then  she  said,  "It's  no  use." 

"What's  no  use?"  I  asked  her,  and  after  a  time 
she  told  me  her  story. 

It  was  a  grim  story;  commonplace  enough,  and 
yet  as  tragic  as  life,  that  story  was  told  to  me  in 
that  smoke-laden  saloon.  The  old  devil  flitted  in 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

and  out,  superintending  his  business ;  the  jingling 
piano  was  going  over  in  the  corner.  Young  girls 
and  women  were  seated  around  the  cheap  pine 
tables.  Some  had  escorts  and  still  others  were 
alone,  nodding  and  winking  at  the  strange  men  as 
they  dropped  in.  Here  in  this  place  where  the  air 
was  full  of  the  reek  of  beer  and  tobacco,  Lena 
spoke  soberly,  in  an  undertone,  so  that  the  pat- 
rons might  not  hear  what  she  was  saying.  Her 
narrative,  which  she  told  without  any  pretense  or 
without  any  appeal  for  sympathy  or  for  help, 
seemed  a  microcasm  of  the  human  race.  The 
whole  of  the  story  was  there ;  from  the  Fall  to  the 
Redemption.  It  seemed  the  blighting  of  the 
hopes  of  mankind.  I  give  it  here  as  a  page,  soiled 
and  grimy  it  may  be,  but  nevertheless  a  veritable 
page  torn  from  the  book  of  life. 

Lena  Murphy  is  a  human  document  in  which  is 
recorded  the  ruin  of  one  of  the  least  of  those  of 
the  brethren  of  Christ.  It  illustrates  many  things 
in  our  social  organization,  from  the  ruthless  sacri- 
fice of  childhood,  due  to  the  lack  of  factory  laws, 
to  the  murderous  brutality  of  conventional  Chris- 
tianity, aping  the  morality  without  the  heart  of 
its  Lord. 


84 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

"No,"  said  Lena,  coldly.  "It's  no  use !  Don't 
commence  no  religion  on  me.  I've  had  enough 
already.  Are  you  a  Church  member  ?" 

"Why?"  I  asked.  "No,  I  am  not  a  Church 
member."' 

"I'm  glad,"  she  said,  "you  are  not  a  Church 
member.  I  have  no  use  for  Church  members.  I 
will  never  go  near  any  of  them  again,  and  if  I 
could  do  any  of  them  any  harm,  I  would  travel  a 
thousand  miles  to  do  it." 

Lena  was  excited  and  troubled.  Something  in 
the  past  seemed  to  harass  her,  and  her  language 
was  more  vigorous  than  can  be  quoted  here. 
After  a  little  she  became  more  restrained,  and  by 
degrees  I  had  her  whole  history. 

She  was  born  of  Irish- American  parents  in  Bos- 
ton in  1880.  Her  father  was  a  carpenter  by  trade. 
Her  mother  died  when  Lena  was  a  mere  child. 
Shortly  after  her  death  the  family  crossed  the 
continent  to  California,  where  her  father  married 
again.  He  was  a  drunkard,  a  gambler  and  a  vio- 
lent-tempered man,  much  given  to  drinking,  and 
inclined  to  treat  his  children  with  great  brutality. 

Lena,  after  spending  a  year  or  two  in  a  convent 
school  in  San  Francisco,  left  before*  she  had 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

learned  to  read  or  write,  and  began  to  make  her 
own  living,  at  nine  years  of  age.  She  was  em- 
ployed in  a  shoe  factory,  where  she  made  from 
$3.00  to  $4.50  a  week  at  piece  work.  At  the  fac- 
tory Lena  learned  to  read  out  of  the  newspapers, 
by  the  aid  of  her  companions,  and  when  she  was 
eleven  was  sufficiently  smart  to  obtain  a  situation 
as  companion  and  reader  to  an  old  lady,  who  was 
an  invalid,  at  $15.00  a  month  and  her  board.  The 
place  was  comfortable.  She  remained  there  until 
she  was  eighteen. 

From  that  situation  she  went  as  chambermaid 
to  a  private  family  in  Golden  Gate  Avenue.  She 
was  eighteen,  full  of  vigor  and  gaiety.  She  was 
a  brunette  with  long,  dark  hair,  a  lively  disposi- 
tion, and  withal  the  charming  audacity  and  confi- 
dence of  inexperience.  She  fell  in  love.  The  man 
was  older  than  she,  and  for  a  time  she  was  as 
happy  as  most  young  people  in  their  first  dream. 
Of  course  she  was  going  to  be  married.  If  only 
the  marriage  day  would  come!  But  there  are 
twenty-four  hours  in  every  day,  and  seven  days 
in  every  week.  Her  betrothed,  not  less  impatient, 
hinted  that  after  all  they  were  already  united, 
why  could  not  they  anticipate  the  ceremony.  Did 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

she  not  trust  him  ?  He  swore  that  it  was  all  right, 
that  everybody  did  the  same,  and  they  would  be 
so  much  more  to  each  other. 

But  why  repeat  the  oft-told  story.  Let  this  be 
a  warning  to  young  womanhood.  At  first  Lena 
would  not  listen  to  the  suggestion.  But  after  a 
time  when  he  pressed  her  and  upbraided  her  and 
declared  that  she  could  not  love  him  if  she  did  not 
trust  him,  she  went  the  way  of  many  thousands, 
only  to  wake  as  they  have  done  with  the  soft  illu- 
sion dissipated  by  the  terrible  reality  of  mother- 
hood drawing  near,  with  no  husband  to  be  a 
father  to  her  child.  When  she  told  him  of  her 
condition,  he  said  it  was  all  right ;  they  must  get 
married  directly.  If  she  would  leave  her  place 
and  meet  him  the  next  day  at  the  corner  of  a  cer- 
tain street,  he  would  take  her  to  a  church  and 
they  would  be  married.  In  all  trusting  innocence, 
relying  upon  his  word,  she  gave  up  her  situation, 
put  up  such  things  as  she  could  carry  and  went 
next  day  to  the  trysting  place.  Of  course  the 
man  was  not  there.  After  waiting  until  heartsick 
she  went  to  make  inquiries;  she  soon  discovered 
the  fatal  truth.  Her  lover  was  a  married  man, 


87 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

and  he  had  skipped  the  town,  followed  by  the 
brother  of  another  of  his  victims. 

Imagine  her  position!  She  had  exactly  fifteen 
cents  in  her  pocket.  If  she  had  gone  home  her 
father,  fierce  and  irascible  as  he  usually  was, 
would  have  thought  little  of  killing  the  daughter 
who  had  brought  disgrace  upon  the  family.  She 
dare  not  return  to  her  old  situation  which  she  had 
left  so  suddenly.  She  had  no  character  from  her 
mistress  and  no  references.  What  was  she  to  do  ? 

Her  position  is  one  in  which  several  thousands 
of  young  women  find  themselves  all  over  the  world 
at  this  very  moment.  She  was  in  the  position  of 
Eve  after  she  had  eaten  the  forbidden  fruit  and 
had  been  cast  out  of  the  Garden  of  Eden. 

It  was  a  modern  version  of  the  Fall,  and  as  the 
Fall  led  down  to  destruction,  so  it  was  with  Lena 
Murphy.  She  seemed  to  be  shut  up  to  sin.  She 
wandered  about  the  town  seeking  work.  Finding 
none  all  that  day,  she  walked  about  in  the  even- 
ing. She  kept  walking  aimlessly  on  and  on,  until 
night  came  and  she  was  afraid.  "When  it  was 
quite  dark  and  she  found  a  quiet  corner  she 
crouched  upon  a  doorstep  and  tried  to  sleep 
What  was  she  to  do  ?  She  was  lonely  and  miser 


m 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

able ;  every  month  her  trouble  would  grow  worse. 
Where  could  she  hide?  She  dozed  off  only  to 
awaken  with  a  start.  No  one  was  near ;  she  tried 
to  sleep  again.  Then  she  got  up  and  walked  a 
little  and  rested  again.  When  morning  came  she 
was  tired  out  and  wretched.  Then  she  remem- 
bered the  address  of  a  girl  she  knew  who  was  liv 
ing  in  the  neighborhood.  She  hunted  her  up  and 
was  made  welcome.  But  her  friend  had  no 
money.  For  one  night  she  sheltered  her,  but 
all  her  efforts  to  find  work  were  in  vain. 

What  was  to  be  done?  On  the  third  day  she 
and  her  friend  met  a  man  who  asked  them  if 
they  wanted  employment.  They  answered  eagerly, 
yes.  He  gave  them  the  address  of  a  woman 
who  he  thought  could  give  them  something  to  do. 
They  went  there  and  found  it  was  a  house  of  ill- 
fame.  The  woman  took  them  in  and  told  them 
they  might  stay.  Lena  hesitated.  But  what  was 
she  to  do?  She  had  lost  her  character  and  her 
place,  and  she  had  no  friends.  Here  she  could  at 
least  get  food  and  shelter,  and  remain  until  her 
baby  was  born.  It  seemed  as  if  she  was  driven  to 
it.  She  said  to  herself  that  she  could  not  help  it, 


89 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

and  so  it  came  to  pass  that  Lena  came  "upon  the 
town." 

Two  years  she  remained  there,  making  the  best 
of  it.  Her  baby  fortunately  died  soon  after  it 
was  born,  and  she  continued  to  tread  the  cinder 
path  of  sin  alone.  This  went  on  for  three  years, 
and  then  there  dawned  upon  her  darkened  life  a 
real  manifestation  of  redeeming  love.  One  day 
when  she  had  had  a  fit  of  the  blues  a  young 
man  came  into  the  house.  He  was  very  young, 
not  more  than  twenty.  Something  in  her  appear- 
ance attracted  him,  and  when  they  were  alone  he 
spoke  to  her  so  kindly  that  she  marveled.  She 
told  him  how  wretched  she  was,  and  he,  treating 
her  as  if  she  were  his  own  sister,  encouraged  her 
to  hope  for  release.  "Take  this,"  he  said,  as  he 
left  her,  giving  her  five  dollars.  ' '  Save  up  all  you 
can  until  you  can  pay  off  all  your  debts  and  then 
we  will  get  you  out  of  this." 

He  came  again,  and  yet  again,  always  treating 
her  in  the  same  brothely  fashion,  and  giving  her 
five  dollars  every  time,  and  never  asking  anything 
in  return. 

After  she  had  saved  up  sufficient  store  to  pay 
off  that  debt  to  the  landlady,  which  hangs  like  a 


90 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

mill-stone  around  the  neck  of  the  unfortunate, 
her  young  friend  told  her  he  had  talked  to  his 
mother  and  his  sister,  and  that  as  soon  as  she  was 
ready  they  would  be  happy  to  take  her  into  their 
home  until  such  time  as  they  could  find  her  a  situ- 
ation. Pull  of  delight  at  the  unexpected  deliver- 
ance, Lena  made  haste  to  leave.  The  young  man's 
mother  was  as  good  as  her  word.  In  that  home 
she  found  a  warm  welcome,  and  a  safe  retreat. 
Lena  made  great  efforts  to  break  off  her  habit  of 
swearing,  and  although  she  every  now  and  then 
failed,  she  made  such  progress  that  at  length  it 
was  deemed  safe  and  prudent  to  let  her  take  a 
place  as  a  general  servant.  The  short  stay  in  that 
Christian  home  had  been  to  her  as  a  glimpse  into 
the  opening  paradise.  Hope  sprang  up  once  more 
into  the  girl's  breast.  She  would  be  an  honest 
woman  once  again.  Thus,  as  we  have  seen  her  re- 
produce the  Fall,  so  we  see  the  blessed  work  of 
the  Eedemption.  Now  we  have  to  see  the  way 
in  which  his  people,  "the  other  ones,"  as  she 
called  them,  shuddering,  fulfilled  their  trust. 

Lena  went  to  a  situation  in  Oakland,  Almeda 
County,  California.    Her  new  mistress  was  a  Mrs. 
a  Catholic  of  devout  disposition.    She 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

was  a  general  servant  at  ten  dollars  a  month.  She 
worked  hard,  and  gave  every  satisfaction.  Even 
the  habit  of  profanity  seemed  to  have  been  con- 
quered. Gradually  the  memory  of  her  past  life 
with  its  hideous  concomitants  was  becoming  faint 
and  dim,  when  suddenly  the  past  was  brought 
back  to  her  with  a  shock.  She  was  serving  at  the 
table  when  she  suddenly  recognized  in  one  of  the 
guests  a  man  who  had  been  a  customer  in  the  old 
"house."  She  felt  as  if  she  was  going  to  drop 
dead  when  she  recognized  him,  but  she  said  noth- 
ing. The  "gentleman,"  Lowever,  was  not  so  reti- 
cent. 

"Where  did  you  get  that  girl  from?"  he  asked 
Mr.  McC . 

"Get  her,"  said  Mr.  McC ;  "why,  she's  a 

servant  in  our  house." 

"Servant,"  sneered  the  guest;  "I  know  her. 
She  is  a from  San  Francisco." 

How  eternally  true  are  Lowell 's  lines : 

Grim-hearted  world,  that  look  'st  with  Levite  eyes 
On  those  poor  fallen  by  too  much  faith  in  man, 

She  that  upon  thy  freezing  threshold  lies, 
Starved  to  more  sinning  by  thy  savage  ban, 

Seeking  that  refuge  because  foulest  vice, 
More  God-like  than  thy  virtue  is,  whose  span 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT, 

Shuts  out  the  wretched  only,  is  more  free 
To  enter  Heaven  than  thou  wilt  ever  be! 

Thou  wilt  not  let  her  wash  thy  dainty  feet 

With  such  salt  things  as  tears,  or  with  rude  hair 

Dry  them,  soft  Pharisee,  that  sitt'st  at  meat 

With  him  that  made  her  such,  and  speak 'st  him  fair, 

Leaving  God's  wandering  lamb  the  while  to  bleat 
Unheeded,  shivering  in  the  pittiless  air; 

Thou  hast  made  prisoned  virtue  show  more  wan 

And  haggard  than  a  vice  to  look  upon. 

But  in  this  case  it  was  even  worse.  The  lamb 
which  had  sought  shelter  was  driven  back  into 
the  wilderness. 

Mr.  McC would  not  believe  it,  but  said 

that  he  woud  tell  his  wife.  •  Mrs.  McC at  once 

sent  for  Lena. 

"If  only  I'd  been  wise,"  she  said  to  me  when 
telling  the  story,  "I  would  have  denied  it,  and 
they  would  have  believed  me.  But  I  thought  I 
had  broken  with  all  that,  and  that  I  had  to  tell 
the  truth.  So  I  owned  up  and  said,  yes,  it  was 
true ;  I  had  been  so,  but  that  I  had  reformed,  and 
had  left  all  that  kind  of  life.  But  the  old  woman, 

d her!  she  would  listen  to  nothing.  *  Faith, 

she  would  not  have  the  disgrace  of  having  a 

in  her  house !'  that  was  all  she  said." 

"Have  you  anything  against  me — have  I  not 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT 

done  your  work  for  you  ever  since  1  came  to 
you?"  I  asked  her. 

"No,"  was  the  reply,  "I  have  nothing  against 
you,  but  I  cannot  have  a  person  of  your  character 
in  my  house.  You  must  go." 

Lena  implored  her  to  give  her  a  chance.  "You 
are  a  Catholic,"  she  said,  "will  you  not  give  me  a 
helping  hand  ?" 

"No,"  was  the  inexorable  reply.  "That  doeg 
not  matter.  I  cannot  have  a in  my  house. ' ' 

Feeling  as  if  she  were  sinking  in  deep  water 
Lena  fell  on  her  knees  sobbing  bitterly  and  beg- 
ged her  for  the  love  of  God  to  have  mercy  on  her 
and  at  least  to  give  her  a  recommendation  so  that 
she  might  get  another  place. 

It  was  no  use.  "I  cannot  do  that,  for  if  any- 
thing went  wrong  I  would  be  to  blame  for  it." 

"Well,  then,"  said  Lena,  "at  least  give  me  a 
line  saying  that  for  the  months  I  have  been  here  I 
have  worked  to  your  satisfaction." 

"No, "she  said. 

' '  The  old  hound ! ' '  exclaimed  Lena  to  me.  ' '  My 
God,  if  ever  I  get  the  chance  I'll  have  that  she 
devil's  life.  Yes,  if  I  swing  for  it.  What  does  it 
matter?  She's  blasted  my  life.  When  I  saw  it 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

was  all  no  use,  I  lost  all  heart  and  all  hope  and  I 
gave  up  then  and  there.  There's  no  hope  for 
such  as  me.  No,  I  had  my  chance  and  she  spoiled 

it,  d n  her  for  a  blasted  old  hypocrite.  And 

now  it's  no  use.  No  use,  never  any  more.  I  use 

dope,  I  drink.  I  'm  lost.  I  'm  only  a  • .  I  shall 

never  be  anything  else.  I'm  far  worse  than  ever 
I  was,  and  am  going  to  the  devil  as  fast  as  I  can. 

It 's  no  use,  but  d n  me  to  blue  blazes  if  I  ever 

come  within  a  thousand  miles  of  that  old  fiend 
if  I  don't  knife  her.  When  I  think  what  I  might 
have  been  but  for  her!  Oh,  God!"  she  cried, 
* '  What  have  they  done  with  my  life  ? ' ' 

What  indeed  ?  After  the  Fall  the  Redemption, 
after  the  Redemption  the  Apostacy  and  now  as 
the  result,  one  of  "The  images  ye  have  made  of 
me." 

"And  He  took  him  by  the  right  hand  and  lifted 
him  up ! "  Lifted  him  up !  My  brother. ' ' 

Nothing  is  more  obvious  to  any  one  who  pays 
attention  to  the  teachings  of  our  Lord  than  the 
fact  that  the  conventional  judgment  about  the 
reputable  and  disreputable  is  foreign  to  the  Chris- 
tian ideal.  Who  are  the  most  disreputable  women 
in  Chicago?  They  are  those  who  have  been 

95 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

dowered  by  society  and  Providence  with  all  the 
gifts  and  all  the  opportunities;  who  have  wealth 
and  who  have  leisure,  who  have  all  the  talents  and 
who  live  entirely  self-indulgent  lives,  caring  only 
for  themselves,  thinking  only  of  the  welfare  of 
their  brothers  and  sisters  in  the  midst  of  whom 
they  live.  Those  women  who  have  great  oppor- 
tunities only  to  neglect  them,  and  who  have  great 
means  only  to  squander  them  upon  themselves, 
are  more  disreputable  in  the  eyes  of  God  and  man 
than  the  worst  harlot  in  the  city  of  Chicago. 

Among  the  many  sad  aspects  of  the  present 
time,  the  saddest  is  the  way  in  which  it  presses 
upon  women.  More  than  ever  before  at  this  time 
do  I  feel  able  to  join  in  the  old  Jewish  prayer,  in 
which,  every  Saturday,  man  thanks  God  that  he 
was  not  born  a  woman.  For  man  in  the  midst  of 
his  misery  and  destitution  is  not  tormented  by  the 
temptation  to  regard  his  virtue  as  a  realizable 
asset.  That  is  the  supreme  misery  of  woman. 
Therefore  I  am  glad  to  think  that  some  women 
are  bestirring  themselves  for  women.  If  one  go 
down  into  the  depths  and  come  face  to  face  with 
the  actual  facts  of  human  life  we  will  find  that  at 
this  moment  in  the  city  the  economic  difficulty 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

confronts  us  at  every  turn.  The  poor  outcast  pre« 
viously  mentioned  was  willing  and  anxious  to 
leave  the  life  she  was  leading  and  did  for  a  while, 
yet  difficulties  arose  that  blasted  the  poor  girl's 
life.  So  it  is  all  around  the  chapter.  For  unless 
all  the  teachings  of  all  the  religions  is  false  it  is 
better  for  a  man  to  lose  his  life  and  be  miserable 
and  poor  and  tormented  than  be  comfortable  and 
the  possessor  of  all  things  and  lose  his  own  soul. 
None  are  in  such  danger  of  losing  their  souls  as 
those  who  are  wrapped  up  in  their  own  selfish 
comfort  and  who  forget  the  necessities  of  the 
brothers  and  sisters  of  the  Lord. 

The  idle  rich !  It  is  difficult  indeed  to  find  lan- 
guage adequate  to  express  the  sense  of  shame,  of 
disgust,  and  humiliation  with  which  we  look  upon 
those  whom  a  bountiful  providence  and  a  kindly 
society  has  showered  all  the  wealth  of  the  world. 
They  have  all  their  hearts  can  desire  and  they  us« 
all  these  blessings  merely  to  gild  their  own  styes 
and  to  increase  the  quality  and  to  improve  the 
flavor  of  the  swill  upon  which  they  fatten.  It  is 
difficult  to  speak  calmly  o±  such  people  or  to  ex- 
press the  degree  of  confusion  and  sorrow  and  in- 
dignation  which  that  class  of  self-indulgent  wo- 

97 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

men  excite  in  the  mind  of  any  intelligent  person, 
I  believe  that  the  frivolous,  self-indulgent  woman 
of  fashion  and  woman  of  society  is  worse,  infin- 
itely worse,  than  many  a  harlot.  These  are  harsh 
words,  but  decent  manhood  and  womanhood  know 
them  to  be  true  and  well  spoken^  and  I  feel  glad 
to  konw  that  they  reverberate  throughout  the 
land. 

Here  are  two  typical  cases.  There  is  a  poor  girl 
come  up  from  the  country  to  this  great  city,  and 
who  is  alone  and  friendless.  She  is  good  looking 
and  gets  a  position  as  a  saleswoman  or  as  a  ste- 
nographer. Her  health  gives  way  and  she  is  laid 
up.  When  she  comes  back  her  place  is  filled  and 
she  is  out  of  a  berth.  She  goes  from  place  to  place 
seeking  work,  and  you  who  have  never  had  to 
do  so  do  not  know  how  hard  it  is  to  seek  for 
work  day  after  day  and  find  none.  In  the  midst 
of  her  trouble,  when  she  is  nearly  at  her  last  cent, 
someone  mmes  along.  He  likes  her  looks,  and 
proposes  tcr  Aer,  with  more  or  less  preamble,  that 
she  go  and  live  with  him.  That  is  the  way  many 
begin.  She  has  no  friends,  she  has  no  money,  and 
the  man  at  least  seems  kind  and  sympathetic, 
which  is  more  than  most  of  them  are.  She  must 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

live.  She  sees  starvation  before  her.  Her  pov- 
erty, not  her  will,  consents.  She  becomes  his  mis- 
tress. After  a  while  he  tells  her  to  go  and  do  as 
the  others  do.  She  is  now  down  in  the  " levee" 
district,  loathing  the  life  she  leads  and  drowning 
her  thoughts  with  drink  and  often  wishing  that 
when  she  lies  down  to  sleep  she  may  never  rise 
again.  That  is  the  common  type.  There  is  an- 
other type,  a  woman  who  is  young  and  strong  and 
healthy,  pretty  and  lazy.  She  does  not  want  to 
work  if  she  can  help  it.  She  sees  that  if,  in  the 
bloom  of  youth,  she  makes  a  market  of  herself 
she  can  earn  more  money  in  a  week  than  what  she 
could  earn  in  a  month  by  hard  work.  She  sells 
herself  accordingly.  She  says,  "I  suppose  my 
body  belongs  to  myself,  and  I  cannot  see  why  I 
oennot  do  what  I  like  with  my  own."  So  she 
does  what  she  likes  and  makes  a  living  out  of  it. 
That  is  another  type. 

Both  types  are  confounded  under  the  common 
cognomen  of  fallen  women  or  prostitutes.  There 
is  all  the  difference  between  them  that  there  is 
between  the  fixed  stars.  I  have  given  both  in  or- 
der that  you  may  compare  them  to  other  counter- 
parts among  the  idle  rich.  There  is  a  woman,  she 

99 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

is  young,  she  belongs  to  the  cream  of  the  cream  of 
society.  She  has  all  the  education  which  wealth 
can  secure  her,  she  has  carriages  to  bear  her  to 
and  fro  so  that  she  will  never  have  to  put  her 
dainty  foot  to  the  pavement.  She  thinks  of  noth- 
ing except  pleasing  herself,  and  uses  her  wealth 
to  minister  to  vanity  and  her  glory.  She  uses  her 
carriages  solely  for  her  own  gratification,  and 
uses  that  priceless  and  peerless  influence  which 
a  good  and  cultivated  woman  can  exercise,  upon 
her  acquaintances  to  increase  the  excitement  and 
frivolity  of  society.  She  does  what  she  likes 
with  her  own.  She  uses  it  all  for  herself,  but, 
having  some  self-respect,  she  draws  the  line  at  her 
carcass,  which  the  other  does  not.  Between  the 
two  what  is  the  difference?  Each  one  uses  what 
she  has  received  to  minister  to  her  own  gratifies 
tion,  her  own  vanity  and  her  own  excitement 
Upon  one  society  showers  all  its  condemnation. 
Press,  pulpit  and  women  all  unite  in  hurling  the 
severest  anathemas  upon  her  who*  is  often  more 
"sinned  against  than  sinning,"  while  they  have 
nothing  but  adulation  and  praise  for  the  pet  of 
society  who  has  never  spent  a  single  thought  ex- 


100 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

cepting  upon  herself.  That  is  bad.  It  is  not  our 
Lord's  way  of  judging. 

Unfortunately  there  is  even  worse  than  that. 
Some  of  our  wealthy  women  do  not  even  draw  the 
line  at  their  carcass.  There  is  one  thought  that 
strikes  us  with  amazement — how  the  women 
reared  in  this  great  republic,  the  daughters  of  our 
millionaires,  who  have  been  born  with  every  Bless- 
ing which  American  civilization  can  give  them, 
instead  of  taking  pride  in  their  American  citizen- 
ship are  ready  in  their  lust  for  vainglory  and 
their  mad  desire  to  outstrip,  if  only  by  a  hair's- 
breadth,  some  rival,  to  sell  themselves  as  much  as 
any  harlot  on  the  "  levee "  to  the  most  miserable 
scion  of  European  nobility. 

The  following  is  taken  from  a  speech  made  by 
Mr.  "William  F.  Stead,  before  the  Chicago  Wom- 
ans  Club: 

"I  remember  one  of  our  dukes  who  bore  an  an- 
cient name.  He  was  divorced  on  the  charge  of 
cruelty  and  adultery.  On  one  occasion  when  I 
was  editing  the  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  he  wrote  a 
letter  for  publication  in  the  paper,  which  dis- 
coursed upon  the  subject  of  bimentalism.  I  sent 
it  back.  I  wrote  him  I  did  not  wish  to  publish  that 


1011 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

letter  or  any  other  letters  in  that  controversy 
now.  But  I  told  him  I  should  not  be  frank  if  I 
did  not  tell  him  that  the  reason  why  I  sent  the 
letter  back,  however,  was  not  because  of  the  sub- 
ject, but  because  of  its  author.  "Rightly,  or 
wrongly,"  I  wrote,  "you  have  the  reputation  for 
ruining  women  for  your  own  pleasure,  and  there- 
fore you  are  infinitely  worse  than  though  you  cut 
throats  for  hire;  therefore  I  return  your  manu- 
script. "  Shortly  afterwards  he  went  to  the  United 
States  and  married  an  American  woman  of  wealth. 
What  do  you  think  of  your  women  if  they  allow 
themselves  to  be  disposed  of  in  this  fashion  ?" 

Mr.  Stead  has  put  the  question  straight  to  us, 
and  it  goes  direct  to  the  homes  of  our  millionaires. 

Why  should  our  young  men  and  women  waste 
their  lives  and  the  divine  enthusiasm  of  youth 
simply  in  their  own  gratification,  and  why  should 
they  give  all  these  to  wine  and  women  and  to  all 
the  methods  of  fashionable  debauchery  when 
there  are  men  and  women  and  children  at  our 
very  door  whom  they  can  help,  and  for  not  help- 
ing, whom  will  they  have  to  answer  on  the  Day  of 
Judgment?  Why,  instead  of  wasting  their  time 
and  their  lives  in  idleness,  why  not  devote  more 


102 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

time  to  the  class  who  were  nearest  and  dearest  to 
the  Master 's  heart  ?  It  is  within  the  power  of  our 
''idle  rich"  to  save  many  Lena  Murphys. 


The 
Strong  Arm   Woman 

Strange  as  it  may  seem  to  one  in  this  enlight- 
ened age,  the  strong  arm  women  exist  to  an 
alarming  extent.  These  robust,  reckless  women 
hesitate  at  nothing  short  of  murder,  and  even 
that  is  often  resorted  to  in  order  to  cover  up  the 
crimes  done  by  them.  They  usually  go  in  pairs, 
and  their  method  of  procedure  is  to  seize  their  in- 
tended victim  as  he  passes  them  and  rush  him  into 
some  dark  hallway,  house  or  alley;  usually  the 
latter.  Some  rent  houses  in  the  tough  districts 
and  either  lure  or  rush  their  victims  in  as  before 
described.  These  wretches  are  usually  employed 
by  some  band  of  men  or  have  lovers,  who 
are  thieves,  and  willingly  do  the  work  for  them. 
They  will  stop  at  nothing  in  the  catagory  of  crime 
and  their  acts  are  so  bold  and  committed  so 
openly  that  the  policemen  on  the  beat  is  pointed 
at  as  a  "stand-in."  When  two  of  these  bleary- 


105 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

eyed,  painted  heavyweigths  accost  you  on  the 
street,  make  your  retreat  as  rapidly  as  possible, 
or  a  watch,  pocket-book  or  perchance  a  diamond 
stud  will  be  among  the  missing.  This  injunction 
is  for  the  unsophisticated,  the  young  men  and  our 
country  cousins. 

I  recall  an  instance  where  the  son  of  a  business 
acquaintance  was  intrusted  with  a  large  sum  of 
money  and  was  sent  with  it  to  a  bank  to  be  de- 
posited. In  passing  along  a  crowded  thorough- 
fare in  the  heart  of  the  West  Side,  he  was  sud- 
denly seized  by  both  arms  and  at  once  rushed 
into  a  neglected  frame  building.  Being  of  rubust 
build  and  of  athletic  tendencies,  the  women  in 
question  were  no  match  for  him.  All  at  once  the 
aims  of  the  women  dawned  upon  him,  and  as  the 
door  was  being  closed  behind  them,  he  gave  one 
of  them  a  terriffic  kick  and  at  the  same  instant 
gave  the  other  one  a  stinging  blow  in  the  face 
which  sent  her  sprawling  on  the  floor.  He  at 
once  made  his  escape,  but  none  too  soon,  however, 
for  just  then  two  rough  looking  men  entered  the 
room  through  another  door,  one  carried  a  long, 
dangerous  looking  knife,  while  the  other  man 


106 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

held  a  vicious  looking  revolver  pointed  straight 
at  his  head. 

Had  the  women  succeeded  in  fastening  the  door, 
the  young  man  would  have  been  at  the  mercy  of 
the  robbers,  and  he  was,  indeed,  fortunate  to  es- 
cape with  his  life. 

Often  these  cheap  houses  are  rented  just  for  the 
purpose  of  robbery,  and  if  a  "good  haul"  is  made 
the  thieves  at  once  vacate  the  premises  after 
blindfolding  and  gagging  their  victim  and  leaving 
them  to  be  found  by  more  merciful  hands. 

As  incredible  as  it  may  seem,  scenes  like  the  one 
here  narrated  are  enacted  every  day  in  our  big 
city.  The  police  do  not  seem  able  to  abate  the 
evil,  and  so  it  goes  on  from  day  to  day.  One  rea- 
son why  the  thieves  are  not  captured  and  pun- 
ished is  owing  to  the  reluctance  of  the  victims  in 
informing  the  authorities.  Some  people  really 
condone  crime  by  the  fear  of  publicity.  While  no 
stain  can  be  attached  to  those  informing  the 
police,  yet  there  are  thousands  of  cases  which 
never  reach  the  lieutenant's  office  and  thousands 
of  other  cases  which  never  reach  the  public.  Much 
blame  should  rest  upon  the  shoulders  of  the  citi- 
zen who  will  tolerate  crime  and  submit  to  numer- 


107 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

ous  insults  and  indignities  rather  than  tell  his 
troubles  to  the  police  judge.  To  sum  up  the  situa- 
tion, there  would  be  much  less  robbery,  if  the  so- 
called  good  citizen  would  do  his  duty. 


101 


Casting  Out  Devils 

They  greatly  err  who  imagine  that  the  doc- 
trine of  diabolical  possession  is  an  exploded  super- 
stition. Not  only  individuals  but  communities 
are  often  the  victims  of  this  unhallowed  appro- 
priation by  the  Powers  of  Evil  of  that  which  was 
designated  as  the  Temple  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  As 
in  olden  time  the  casting  out  of  devils  was  one  of 
the  most  manifest  signs  of  the  power  of  the 
Messiah,  so  to-day  if  he  were  to  appear  amongst 
us  in  Chicago  He  would  doubtless  signalize  His 
divine  presence  and  power  in  a  similar  fashion. 

Chicago,  like  other  cities,  is  possessed  by  a  host 
of  unclean  spirits,  whose  name  is  Legion,  for  they 
are  many.  Especially  so  in  the  political  life  of 
the  great  city.  From  the  head  on  down  to  the 
most  menial  and  underpaid  servant  of  the  people, 
graft  and  political  debauchery  holds  full  sway, 
and  can  be  sufficiently  distinguished  to  be  named 
and  described  should  I  choose  to  name  the  recre- 
ants in  this  connection 


100 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

The  citizen  and  taxpayer  is  plundered  by  polit- 
ical tricksters,  and  are  forced  to  bear  burdens 
and  submit  to  losses  which  could  be  avoided  by  a 
more  sensible  treatment  of  their  affairs. 

The  process  of  the  accumulation  of  the  grafters 
goes  on  irresistibly.  The  snow  ball  gathers  as  it 
grows.  Men  become  rich  and  even  millionaires 
off  of  moderate  salaries.  The  transformation  is 
hidden  from  the  multitude  because  the  coming 
despot  eschews  the  tawdy  tinsel  of  the  crown, 
and  liberty  is  believed  to  be  as  safe  as  well,  let 
us  say,  as  the  populace  of  Rome  believed  the  re- 
public to  be  when  Julius  Caesar  refused  the  im- 
perial purple.  Everywhere  the  sworn  officers 
have  the  people  by  the  throat.  The  taxpayer  is 
his  servant,  and  at  present  stands  in  some  danger 
^f  becoming  his  slave. 

Graft  winds  around  us,  covering  us  and  en- 
veloping us  in  its  slimy  folds.  It  is  a  spider  in  its 
shape,  a  chameleon  in  its  rapid  changes  of  hue. 
When  angry  it  becomes  purple.  Its  most  dis- 
gusting characteristic  is  its  impalpability,  Its 
slimy  folds  strangle ;  its  very  touch  paralizes.  It 
looks  like  a  mass  of  scarbutic  gangrened  flesh ;  it 
is  a  hideous  picture  of  loathsome  disease.  Once 


Hi) 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

fixed  you  cannot  tear  it  away  by  court  or  jury. 
It  clings  closely  to  its  prey.  The  taxpayers  and 
general  voters  are  struggling  with  a  void  which 
possesses  eight  Antennae.  No  scratches,  no  bites, 
but  an  undescribable  suffocation.  The  terrible 
wretch  grins  upon  you  with  a  thousand  foul 
mouths.  The  hydra  incorporates  itself  with  the 
man,  and  the  man  with  the  hydra.  You  become 
one  and  the  same.  The  grafter  presses  upon  you, 
and  you  retain  its  pressure  with  only  a  low  mur- 
mur. The  devil  fish  draws  you  into  its  system. 
He  drags  you  to  him  and  into  him;  bound  help- 
lessly, glued  where  you  stand,  utterly  powerless, 
you  are  gradually  emptied  into  a  loathsome  recep- 
ticle,  and  the  grafter  lives  off  the  fat  of  the  land. 
[When  will  the  voters  oast  out  the  devils  T 


in 


Some  Good  Work 

As  investigator  for  the  Douglas  Neighborhood 
Club,  it  was  my  good  fortune  to  be  instrumental 
in  ridding  a  portion  of  Chicago  of  the  undesirable 
element  which  hang  on  with  "bull-dog  tenacity '' 
to  the  beautiful  residence  district  of  the  South 
Side. 

The  following  is  a  report  submitted  to  the  club 
of  some  of  the  work  done : 

The  Douglas  Neighborhood  Club: 

The  following  is  some  of  the  work  accomplished 
in  the  past  six  months  by  your  investigator. 

Arrested  and  convicted  Mrs. ,  house  of  ill- 
fame  and  harboring  girls  under  age,  in  the  Silver- 
man  building. 

Reported  Miss and  three  inmates  to  Lieut. 

S — -,  who  removed  them  at  once.  They  were 
tenants  in  the  Silverman  building. 

Arrested  and  convicted  Miss for  renting 

rooms  for  immoral  purposes. 

Arrest  and  conviction  of  Miss  ,  house  of 


113 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

prostitution.  Took  minimum  fine  and  agreed  to 
leave  the  city. 

The  arrest  and  conviction  of  Mr. ,  corner  of 

32nd  and  Indiana  avenue,  keeper  of  saloon  and 
house  of  assignation.  Saloon  closed  and  has  never 
been  re-opened,  though  persistent  efforts  have 
been  made  to  open  another  saloon  under  new 
management. 

Arrested  Mr. ,  owner  of  saloon  and  assig- 
nation house,  corner  of  35th  and  South  Park  Ave- 
nue. He  was  compelled  to  leave  the  district. 

We  have  closed  up  and  put  "For  Rent"  signs 
on  about  sixty-five  houses  of  assignation.  These 
are  the  places  where  men  take  young  girls  and 
women  for  immoral  purposes. 

Closed  up  about  twenty  houses  of  ill-fame 
where  women  are  kept  for  immoral  purposes. 

We  arrested  the  notorious  Madame ,  3000 

Indiana  Avenue,  for  keeping  a  house  of  ill-fame 
and  hooche-cooche  dance. 

Arrested  and  convicted  Mrs.  ,  assignation 

house. 

Arrested  Mr. ,  3028  Cottage  Grove  Avenue, 

house  of  assignation. 


114 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

Arrested  proprietor  of  Hotel  Foster,  corner 
39th  and  Ellis  Avenue,  house  of  assignation. 

Arrested  Mr.  ,  owner  of  apartment  build- 
ing, for  allowing  it  to  be  used  for  immoral  pur- 
poses. Through  the  Club's  efforts  twelve  flats 
were  vacated  in  this  building. 

Forced  occupants  to  move  from  192  East  32nd 
street  without  arrest. 

Caused  removal  of  tenant  from  northeast  cor- 
ner of  33rd  street  and  South  Park  Avenue. 

Removal  of  tenant  who  occupied  a  barn  in  alley 
east  of  Indiana  Avenue,  near  31st  street.  Com- 
plaint made  by  residents  in  the  vicinity. 

Caused  removal  of  tenant  at  214  East  33rd 
street. 

Had  Miss moved  from  her  home,  which  she 

had  recently  bought  on  South  Park  Avenue,  near 
35th  streets,  keeper  of  house  of  ill-fame.  Has 
never  been  allowed  to  re-occupy  same. 

Reported  to  police  and  had  tenants  move  from 
house  on  Michigan  Avenue. 

Arrest  and  conviction  of  Mrs. ,  3447  Prai- 
rie Avenue,  assignation  house  for  married  women. 

Arrest  and  conviction  of  Mr.  ,  216  East 


115 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

31st  street,  saloon-keeper,  for  keeping  open  after 
hours. 

Arrest  of  Miss ,  house  of  ill-fame.  Com- 
pelled her  to  move  from  the  district. 

Arrest  and  conviction  of  Miss ,  house  of  ill- 
fame,  3000  Indiana  Avenue.  This  was  the  second 
arrest  in  this  building. 

One  of  the  most  aggravated  cases  we  have  had 

to  contend  with  was  that  of  Mrs. ,  whom  we 

arrested  on  the  charge  of  pandering.  She  very 
willingly  sold  a  girl  to  us  for  $50,  but  as  the  in- 
vestigators did  not  purchase  the  girl  for  the  pur- 
pose of  taking  her  to  a  house  of  prostitution,  we 
had  no  particular  standing  in  the  court,  as  the 
law  reads  that  the  person  purchased  or  sold  must 
be  used  for  that  purpose.  As  the  investigators 
had  no  intention  of  buying  the  girl  for  immoral 
purposes  the  attorneys  asked  that  the  case  be 
dismissed. 

Have  visited  dozens  of  flats  and  residences  that 
have  been  reported  to  us  as  suspicious.  In  many 
cases  the  tenants  have  moved  away  after  such 
visits. 

The  above  are  some  of  the  arrests  and  convic- 
tions, etc.,  that  your  investigators  have  caused. 


116 


CHICAGO  BY  GAS  LIGHT. 

We  find  that  the  warfare  must  be  continuous.  We 
also  find  that  publicity  is  one  of  the  greatest  weap- 
ons which  we  have  in  fighting  the  disreputables 
in  our  district.  Invariably  the  women  will  ask 
whether  it  will  get  into  the  papers,  and  have 
more  dread  of  publicity  than  they  do  of  the  police 
courts.  We  still  have  some  cases  pending  in 
court. 

Yours  very  truly, 

SAMUEL  P.  WILSON, 
Investigator  for  the  Douglas  Neighborhood 
Club. 

Note— The  names  of  the  above  parties  have 
been  omitted  for  various  reasons.  Some  are  now 
out  of  business  and  others  have  left  the  district, 
and  as  our  Association  does  not  believe  in  perse- 
cuting anyone,  we  believe  the  reader  will  appre- 
ciate the  omission  of  the  same. 


117 


PART  II. 


INTENDED  FOR  BOYS  AND  GIRLS.    ALL 

WHO  HAVE  ARRIVED  AT  THE 

YEARS  OP  DISCRETION. 


CONTENTS 


The  Lost  Sisterhood. 
A  Farewell  to  Innocence. 
The  Gates  of  Hell 
The  Caldron  of  Woe. 
The  Romance  of  Crime. 


The  Lost  Sisterhood 

Prevalence  of  Prostitution  in  Chicago. 

Prostitution  is  an  appalling  evil  in  Chicago. 
One  can  scarcely  look  in  any  direction  without 
seeing  some  evidence  of  it.  Street  walkers  parade 
the  most  prominent  thoroughfares,  dance  houses 
and  low  concert  halls  flaunt  their  gaudy  signs  in 
public,  and  houses  of  ill-fame  are  conducted  with 
a  boldness  unequalled  anywhere  in  the  world. 
The  evil  is  very  great,  and  is  assuming  larger  pro- 
portions every  year,  and  I  now  make  the  startling 
assertion,  that  the  prostitutes  of  Chicago  are  as 
numerous  as  the  members  of  the  largest  denomina- 
tion of  the  city.  From  the  most  reliable  informa- 
tion obtainable  there  are  about  six  hundred  houses 
of  prostitution  and  about  two  hundred  and  fifty 
assignation  houses  in  Chicago.  The  number  of 
women  known  as  prostitutes,  and  those  who  T<  re- 
ceive" privately,  and  associate  with  women  whose 


121 


CHICAGO 

character  is  beyond  reproach,  is  astounding.  Of 
the  number  of  women  who  resort  to  prostitution 
as  a  means  of  securing  money,  or  from  other  mo- 
tives, who  yet  manage  to  maintain  positions  of  re- 
spectability in  society,  of  course  no  estimate  can 
be  made.  They  are,  unfortunately,  very  numer- 
ous, and  are  said  by  persons  in  position  to  speak 
with  some  degree  of  accuracy  to  equal  the  pro- 
fessionals in  numbers. 

These  things  are  sad  to  contemplate  and  disa- 
greeable to  write  about.  The  whole  subject  is 
unsavory;  but  no  picture  of  Chicago  would  be 
eomplete  did  it  not  include  an  account  of  this  ter- 
rible feature  of  city  life,  which  meets  the  visitor 
at  almost  every  turn ;  and  it  is  believed  that  some 
good  may  be  accomplished  by  stripping  the  sub- 
ject of  all  its  romance,  and  presenting  it  to  the 
reader  in  its  true  and  hideous  colors. 

The  professional  women  of  Chicago  represent 
every  grade  of  their  wretched  life,  from  the  hells 
of  the  fashionable  houses  of  ill-fame  to  the  slowly 
dying  inmates  of  a  Dearborn  street  brothel.  They 
begin  their  career  with  the  hope  that  they  will 
always  remain  in  the  class  into  which  they  enter, 
but  find,  when  it  is  too  late,  they  must  go  steadily 


122 


CHICAGO 

down  into  the  depths,  closing  their  lives  with  a 
horrible  death  and  a  pauper's  grave. 

The  so-called  first-caiss  houses  of  Chicago  are 
conducted  with  more  or  less  secrecy.  It  is  the 
object  of  the  proprietress  to  remain  unknown 
to  the  police  as  long  as  possible,  but  she  finds 
at  last  that  this  is  impracticable.  The  sharp-eyed 
patrolmen  soon  discover  suspicious  signs  about 
the  house  and  watch  it  until  their  suspicions  are 
verified,  when  the  establishment  is  recorded  as  a 
house  of  ill-fame,  and  placed  under  police  surveil- 
lance. These  houses  are  not  numerous,  however, 
and  not  more  than  thirty  in  the  entire  city.  Large 
rents  are  paid  for  them,  and  they  are  generally 
hired  furnished.  They  are  located  in  some  quiet, 
respectable  portion  of  the  city,  and  outwardly 
appear  to  be  simply  private  dwellings.  It  often 
happens  that  the  neighbors  are  in  ignorance  of  the 
true  character  of  the  house,  long  after  it  is  known 
to  the  police.  It  is  a  notorious  fact  that  some  of 
our  finest  avenues  and  boulevards  are  infected 
with  the  infamous  "  houses. "  The  proprietress 
is  a  woman  of  respectable  appearance,  and  passes 
as  a  married  woman,  some  man  generally  living 
with  her,  and  passing  as  her  husband.  This  en- 


123 


CHICAGO 

ables  her  in  case  of  trouble  with  the  authorities, 
to  show  a  legal  protector  and  insist  upon  her 
claim  to  be  a  married  woman. 

The  inmates  are  women  in  the  first  flush  of  their 
charms.  They  are  handsome,  well  dressed,  gen- 
erally refined  in  manner,  and  conduct  themselves 
with  outward  propriety;  rude  and  boistrous  con- 
duct, improper  language,  and  indecent  behavior 
are  forbidden  in  the  parlors  of  the  house,  and  a 
casual  visitor  passing  through  public  rooms  of  the 
place  would  see  nothing  out  of  the  usual  way. 

It  is  difficult  to  learn  the  causes  which  induce 
these  women  to  adopt  a  life  of  shame.  No  reliance 
whatever  can  be  placed  upon  the  stories  they  tell 
of  themselves.  It  cannot  be  doubted,  however, 
that  they  are  generally  of  respectable  origin,  and 
some  of  them  are  otherwise  fitted  to  adorn  the 
best  circles  of  society.  Some  are  young  women 
who  have  been  led  astray  by  men  who  have  failed 
to  keep  their  promises  to  them,  and  have  drifted 
into  sin  to  hide  their  shame,  others  are  wives  who 
have  left,  or  have  been  deserted  by  their  husbands ; 
others  still  have  deliberately  chosen  the  life,  grati- 
fying their  love  for  money  and  dress ;  and  others 
again  appear  to  be  influenced  by  motives  of  pure 


124 


CHICAGO 

licentiousness.  Whatever  the  cause  of  adoption 
of  such  a  life,  it  is  evident  they  have  seen  bet- 
ter days.  They  are  still  fresh  and  attractive,  and 
for  a  while  pursue  their  gilded  career  of  sin  and 
shame,  hoping  that  they  may  be  fortunate  enough 
to  retain  their  place  in  the  aristocracy  of  vice. 
The  proprietress  will  have  no  others  than  attrac- 
tive women  in  her  house ;  and  as  soon  as  the  in- 
mates begin  to  show  signs  of  the  wretched  life 
they  lead,  as  soon  as  sickness  falls  upon  them,  or 
they  lose  their  beauty  and  freshness,  she  sends 
them  away,  and  fills  their  places  with  more  at- 
tractive women.  She  has  no  difficulty  in  doing 
this,  for  she  has  her  agents  on  the  watch  for  them 
all  the  time,  and  unfortunately  new  women  are 
always  soliciting  admission  to  such  places.  Be- 
sides this,  the  proprietress  knows  that  her  patrons 
soon  grow  tired  of  seeing  the  same  women  in  her 
establishment.  She  must  make  frequent  changes 
to  satisfy  them,  and  she  has  no  scruples  about 
turning  a  woman  out  of  her  doors  to  begin  the 
descent  of  the  ladder  of  shame.  Therefore,  about 
one  or  two  years  is  the  average  term  of  the  stay 
of  a  woman  in  a  fashionable  house.  A  few  do  re- 
main longer,  but  the  number  is  so  small  as  to 


125 


CHICAGO 

constitute  scarcely  an  exception  to  the  general 
rule.  As  long  as  her  " boarders7'  remain  with  her, 
the  proprietress  treats  them  fairly  enough,  apart 
from  the  fact  that  she  manages  to  get  out  of  them 
all  the  money  she  can.  The  women  earn  large 
amounts  of  money,  but  a  considerable  portion  of 
this  goes  for  board  and  other  expenses  in  the 
house,  and  their  extravagant  habits  and  tastes 
exhaust  the  rest.  They  save  nothing,  and  if  taken 
sick  must  go  to  the  Charity  Hospital  for  treat- 
ment. Their  dream  of  saving  money  lasts  but  a 
short  time,  and  they  leave  the  fashionable  houses 
penniless. 

The  visitors  to  these  houses  are  men  of  means. 
No  one  without  a  full  pocket  can  afford  such  in 
dulgence.  Visitors  are  expected  to  spend  consid- 
erable money  for  wine,  which  is  always  furnished 
by  the  proprietress  at  the  most  exhorbitant  prices, 
and  at  a  profit  of  about  200  per  cent.  A  large 
part  of  her  revenue  is  derived  from  such  sales, 
and  she  looks  sharply  after  this  branch  of  the 
business.  The  shamelessness  with  which  men  of 
standing  and  prominence,  many  of  whom  are 
fathers  of  familes,  resort  to  these  houses  and 
display  themselves  in  the  parlors  is  astounding. 


126 


CHICAGO 

Indeed,  the  keeper  of  one  of  the  most  fashionable 
houses  boasts  that  married  men  are  her  principal 
customers.  Sometimes  the  visitor  desires  that  his 
visits  shall  not  be  known.  For  such  persons  there 
are  private  rooms,  where  they  are  sure  of  seeing 
no  one  but  the  proprietress  and  the  woman  for 
whom  their  visit  is  intended.  These  houses  are 
largely  attended  by  strangers  visiting  Chicago; 
these,  thinking  themselves  unknown  in  a  large 
city,  care  little  for  privacy,  and  boldly  show  them- 
selves in  the  general  parlors.  The  proportion  of 
married  and  middle-aged  men  among  them  is  very 
great.  You  will  find  among  them  lawyers,  physi- 
cians, judges  of  the  courts,  members  of  congress, 
and  even  ministers  of  the  gospel,  from  all  parts 
of  the  country.  This  may  seem  a  startling  asser- 
tion, but  the  police  authorities  will  confirm  it.  If 
the  secrets  of  these  places  as  regards  their  visi- 
tors could  be  made  public  there  would  be  a  ter- 
rible rupture  in  many  happy  families  throughout 
the  land,  as  well  as  in  the  metropolis.  Men  who 
at  home  are  models  of  propriety,  seem  to  lose  all 
sense  of  restraint  when  they  come  to  Chicago. 
These  same  gentlemen  would  be  merciless  towards 


127 


CHICAGO 

any  female  member  of  their  famdiies  who  should 
display  a  similar  laxity. 

To  return  to  the  women:  the  inmates  of  the 
first-class  houses  rarely  remain  in  them  for  more 
than  two  years.  Their  shameful  and  dissipated 
lives  render  them  by  this  time  unfit  for  compan- 
ionship with  their  aristocratic  associates.  The  pro- 
prietress quickly  detects  this  and  remorselessly 
orders  them  from  her  house.  She  knows  the  fate 
that  awaits  them;  but  her  only  care  is  to  keep 
her  house  full  of  fresh  and  attractive  women. 

The  Next  Step. 

Having  quitted  the  fashionable  house,  the 
wretched  woman  has  no  recourse  but  to  enter  a 
second-class  house,  and  then  go  down  one  grade 
lower  in  vice.  The  proprietress  is  cruel  and  exact- 
ing, and  boldly  robs  her  boarders  whenever  oc- 
casion offers.  The  visitors  are  more  numerous, 
but  are  a  rougher  and  coarser  set  than  those  who 
patronized  her  in  the  first  stages  of  her  careei. 
Money  is  less  plentiful,  her  life  is  harder  in  every 
way,  and  she  seeks  relief  from  the  reflections  that 
will  crowd  upon  her  in  drink,  and  perhaps  to 


128 


CHICAGO 

drunkenness  adds  the  vice  of  opium.  Her  health 
breaks  fast,  what  was  left  of  her  beauty  when  she 
entered  the  house  soon  fades,  and  in  two  or  three 
years  she  becomes  unfit  to  even  remain  in  a  sec- 
ond-class house.  She  is  turned  into  the  street  by 
the  proprietress,  who  generally  robs  her  of  her 
money  and  jewelry,  and  sometimes  even  of  her 
clothing,  save  what  she  has  on  at  the  time.  The 
wretches  who  keep  these  houses  do  not  hesitate 
to  detain  a  woman's  trunk,  or  other  effects,  upon 
some  trumped-up  charge  of  arrears  or  debt,  when 
they  have  no  longer  any  use  for  her.  The  poor 
creature  has  no  redress,  and  is  obliged  to  submit 
in  silence  to  any  wrong  practiced  upon  her. 

The  woman  whose  career  opened  so  brilliantly 
is  now  a  confirmed  prostitute  and  drunkard, 
bloated,  sickly  and  perhaps  diseased ;  she  is  with- 
out hope,  and  there  is  nothing  left.  It  is  only  four 
or  five  years,  perhaps  less,  since  she  entered  the 
fashionable  boulevard  mansion,  beautiful  and  at- 
tractive in  all  the  freshness  of  her  charms,  and 
little  dreaming  of  the  fate  in  store  for  her.  She 
is  not  an  exception  to  the  rule,  however.  She  has 
but  followed  the  usual  road,  and  met  the  inevita- 
ble doom  of  her  class. 


129 


CHICAGO 

Going  Down  Into  the  Depths, 

From  the  second-class  house  the  lost  woman 
passes  into  one  of  the  bagnios  of  the  ''red-light 
district"  or  some  similar  place.  Here  her  lot  is 
infinitely  more  wretched.  Her  companions  are  the 
vilest  of  her  class,  and  the  visitors  are  among  the 
lowest  order  of  men  who  cannot  gain  admittance 
into  places  snch  as  she  has  left.  She  finds  herself 
a  slave  to  the  keeper  of  the  house,  who  is  often  a 
burly  ruffian,  and  even  more  brutal  than  a  woman 
would  be  in  the  same  position.  She  is  robbed  of 
her  earnings,  is  beaten,  and  often  falls  into  the 
hands  of  the  police.  She  becomes  familiar  with 
the  courts,  the  bridewell,  and  whatever  of  woman- 
ly feeling  remained  to  her  is  crushed  out  of  her. 
She  is  a  brute  simply.  She  remains  in  Green,  Peo- 
ria  or  some  other  like  street  for  a  year  or  two- 
human  nature  cannot  bear  up  longer  under  such  a 
life — and  is  then  unfit  to  remain  even  there.  Would 
you  seek  her  after  this  you  will  find  her  in  the 
terrible  dens  and  living  hells — even  in  places  of 
infamy  and  degredation  that  a  former  Mayor  was 
compelled  to  stamp  out,  so  utterly  repugnant  was 
it  to  even  the  lowest  instincts  of  man.  To  the 


130 


CHICAGO 

burning  disgrace  of  Chicago,  some  of  these  pes- 
tiferous vice-breeding  places  are  allowed  to  exist 
by  the  "stink-pots"  who  govern  the  city.  These 
poor,  vile,  repulsive  women,  slowly  dying  from 
their  bodily  ailments,  and  the  effects  of  drink  and 
drugs,  have  reached  the  bottom  of  the  ladder,  and 
can  go  no  lower.  She  knows  it,  and  in  a  sort  of 
dumbly,  desperate  way,  is  glad  it  is  so.  Life  is 
such  a  daily  torture  to  her,  that  death  only  offers 
her  any  relief.  She  is  really  a  living  corpse.  The 
end  soon  comes.  Some  die  from  the  effects  of 
their  terrible  lives,  and  oh!  such  fearful  deaths; 
and  others  are  killed  or  fatally  injured  in  drunken 
brawls  which  so  often  occur  in  this  locality ;  and 
ethers  still  seek  an  end  of  their  miserable  exist- 
ence in  the  dark  waters  of  Lake  Michigan. 

I  draw  no  exaggerated  picture  of  the  gradual 
but  inevitable  descent  of  a  fallen  woman  in  Chi- 
cago. Every  detail  is  true  to  life.  Seven  years 
is  the  average  life  of  an  abandoned  woman  in  the 
great  city.  She  may  begin  her  career  with  all  the 
eclat  possible,  she  may  queen  it  by  nature  of  her 
beauty  and  charms  in  some  fashionable  house,  at 
the  beginning,  and  may  even  outlast  the  average 
term  at  such  places;  it  matters  not;  her  doom  is 


131 


CHICAGO 

certain.  The  time  will  come  when  she  must  leave 
the  aristocracy  of  shame,  must  take  the  second 
step  in  her  terrible  career.  Seven  years  for  the 
majority  of  these  women,  then  death  in  its  most 
horrible  form.  Some  may,  and  do,  anticipate  the 
end  of  it  by  suicide ;  few  ever  escape  from  it. 

1 1  The  wages  of  sin  is  death. ' '  Some  cherish  the 
hope  that  after  a  few  years  of  pleasure,  they  will 
reform ;  but  alas,  they  find  it  impossible  to  do  so. 
A  few,  a  very  few,  do  escape,  through  the  aid  ex- 
tended to  them  by  the  "missions,"  but  they  are  so 
few  that  they  but  help  to  emphasize  the  hopeless- 
ness of  the  effort.  The  doom  of  the  fallen  woman 
is  swift  and  sure!  "The  wages  of  sin  is  death." 
Once  entered  upon  a  career  of  shame,  the  whole 
world  sets  its  face  against  her.  Even  the  men  who 
associated  with  her  in  her  palmy  days  would  turn 
a  deaf  ear  to  her  appeals  for  aid  after  she  has 
gone  down  into  the  depths.  I  would  to  God  that 
the  women  who  are  about  to  enter  upon  this  terri- 
ble life  could  walk  through  the  purlieu  of  the 
"red-light"  district  and  witness  the  sights  that  I 
have  seen  there.  I  would  they  could  see  the 
awful,  despairing  faces  that  look  out  from  the 


132 


CHICAGO 

bagnios  of  that  terrible  nieghborhood,  and  realize 
that,  however  brilliant  the  opening  of  their  career 
may  be,  this  must  be  the  end  of  it.  It  is  idle  for 
them  to  hope  to  escape  the  doom  of  the  fallen 
woman.  "The  wages  of  sin  is  death."  Would 
anyone  know  what  sort  of  death  ?  Let  her  come 
to  Chicago  and  see. 

Many  of  the  women  of  the  town  never  pass 
through  the  various  gradations  of  vice  that  I  have 
described. 

Many  never  see  the  inside  of  a  fashionable  house 
of  ill-fame,  but  begin  lower  down  the  scale,  as 
inmates  of  second-class  houses,  as  waiter  girls  in 
concert  saloons,  as  inmates  of  dance  houses — 
which  were  so  prevalent  in  Chicago  years  ago — 
or  as  street  walkers.  These  meet  their  inevitable 
doom  all  the  more  quickly,  but  not  less  surely. 

The  city  is  full  of  people,  men  and  women, 
whose  object  is  to  lead  young  girls  into  lives  of 
shame.  They  watch  the  hotels,  depots  and  large 
stores  and  lure  respectable  girls  away  on  various 
pretexts.  Every  inducement  is  held  out  to  work- 
ing girls  and  women  to  adopt  the  vile  trade,  and 
many  fall  willing  victims.  Hundreds  of  these 
women  are  from  rural  districts  of  adjoining  states. 


133 


CHICAGO 

They  come  to  the  city  seeking  work  and  are  some- 
times successful.  Often,  however,  they  can  find 
nothing  to  do,  and  when  poverty  and  want  stare 
them  in  the  face,  they  listen  to  the  voice  of  the 
tempter,  become  street  walkers  or  inmates  of 
houses  of  ill-fame.  Sometimes,  while  they  are  in 
the  first  days  of  their  success,  they  will  write 
home  that  they  are  pursuing  honest  callings  in  the 
city  and  earning  respectable  livings,  and  will  even 
send  money  home  to  their  deluded  parents.  After 
a  while  the  letters  cease — the  writer  has  gone 
into  the  depths ;  they  are  lost ! 

It  is,  indeed,  strange  to  see  how  these  women 
will  cherish  the  memory  of  their  homes  even  in 
the  midst  of  their  shame.  They  will  speak  at  the 
pleasant  home,  or  their  aged  father  and  mother, 
in  accents  full  of  despair.  Often  these  memories 
will  cause  them  to  burst  into  uncontrollable  weep- 
ing. If  one  should  try  to  take  advantage  of  this 
moment  of  tenderness,  and  urge  them  to  make  an 
effort  to  reform,  they  are  met  with  but  one  an- 
swer: "It  is  too  late." 

The  keepers  of  the  bagnios  of  the  city  use  every 
means  to  lure  young  women  into  theii^  power. 
Some  years  since,  a  girl  who  LAG  managed  to 


134 


CHICAGO 

escape  from  a  notorious  brothel,  told  the  follow- 
ing story : 

"I  watched  the  advertisements  in  the  papers  to 
see  something  that  would  suit  me.    I  learned  that 

a  Mrs.  G of street  wanted  two  girls  to  do 

light  chamber  work,  and  I  hastened  there,  with  a 
friend,  in  quest  of  the  position.  We  were  received 

by  Mrs.  G ,  who  began  to  explain  to  us  the 

nature  of  the  duties  we  were  expected  to  perform. 
It  was  an  awful  proposition.  She  kept  a  house  of 
ill-fame.  We  fled.  I  was  much  discouraged.  Not 
so  my  friend,  who  told  me*  there  was  another  lady 
down  the  street,  who  was  really  in  want  of  a  girl 
to  help  her.  We  went  to  her  house.  It  was  an- 
other of  the  same  sort ;  but  after  I  got  in  there  my 
clothes  were  taken  from  me,  and  the  woman  fur- 
nished me  with  some  sort  of  silk,  trimmed  with 
fur,  and  tried  to  make  me  act  like  the  other  girls 
in  her  establishment.  I  remained  there  from  Sat- 
urday to  Wednesday  night,  because  I  could  not 
get  away.  I  had  no  clothes  to  wear  in  the  streets, 
even  if  I  should  succeed  in  reaching  them,  which 
was  impossible,  and  the  woman  who  kept  the 
house  was  angry  with  me,  brutally  so,  because  I 
would  not  comply  with  her  wishes.  I  and  another 


135 


CHICAGO 

young  girl  tried  to  escape  by  the  back  yard.  The 
other  girl  got  away,  but  I  was  discovered  by  the 
keeper,  who  drove  me  back  into  the  house  with 
curses.  On  Wednesday  evening  I  was  made  to  sit 
at  a  window  and  call  a  man,  who  was  passing,  into 
the  house.  He  turned  out  to  be  a  detective,  and 
arrested  me,  and  was  the  means  of  my  freedom !" 

The  police  are  often  called  upon  by  relatives 
of  abandoned  women  to  assist  them  in  finding 
them  and  rescuing  them  from  their  lives  of  shame. 
Sometimes,  in  the  cases  of  very  young  girls,  these 
efforts  are  successful,  and  the  poor  creature  gladly 
goes  with  friends.  Others  again  refuse  to  leave 
their  wretched  haunts;  they  prefer  to  lead  their 
lives  of  infamy. 

One  night  a  young  man  called  at  the  "Apollo/* 
a  theatre  and  dance  house  on  Third  Avenue — now 
Plymouth  Place — and  inquired  for  his  sister  Dora, 
who,  he  had  learned,  was  in  that  place.  The 
young  lady  came  out,  while  he  was  speaking,  in 
company  with  a  well-dressed  man.  Instead  of 
complying  with  her  brother's  entreaties,  she  en- 
tered a  carriage,  with  her  escort,  and  drove  to  a 
nearby  police  station  to  seek  relief  from  her 
brother's  importunities.  The  brother  followed, 


136 


CHICAGO 

told  the  sergeant  the  story  of  his  sister's  shame, 
and  asked  him  to  keep  her  there  until  he  could 
summon  the  father.  The  sergeant  complied  with 
the  request  and  the  father  soon  appeared.  He  was 
a  respectable  oil  manufacturer  and  had  lavished 
wealth  and  fine  dress  upon  the  wayward  child. 
He  confirmed  his  son's  statements,  and  appealed 
to  his  daughter  to  go  home  with  him.  She  an- 
swered him  flippantly,  and  the  indignant  father 
cursed  her  for  her  sin,  and  would  have  attacked 
the  man  with  her  had  not  officers  prevented  him. 
The  woman  was  locked  up  for  the  night  in  the 
station  house,  and  brought  before  court  the  next 
morning.  The  father  urged  that  she  should  be 
sent  to  some  reformatory  establishment,  but  the 
woman  met  him  with  the  statement  that  she  was 
twenty-three  years  old,  beyond  legal  control,  and 
therefore  entitled  to  choose  her  own  mode  of  life. 
Her  plea  was  valid,  and  the  magistrate  was  un- 
willingly compelled  to  discharge  her  from  custody, 
though  he  endeavored  to  persuade  her  to  return  to 
her  family.  She  then  left  the  court  room,  was 
joined  by  several  flashily-dressed  women,  and 
departed  in  high  spirits,  completely  ignoring  her 
relatives. 


137 


CHICAGO 

One  of  the  worst  classes  of  abandoned  women 
consists  of  street  walkers.  On  any  of  the  business 
streets  and  even  in  outlying  districts  these  wom- 
en are  very  numerous.  They  are  generally  well 
dressed,  and,  as  a  rule,  are  young.  They  pursue 
certain  regular  routes,  rarely  pausing,  unless  they 
"  pick-up "  a  companion,  when  they  dart  off  with 
him  to  some  side  street.  On  the  brilliantly  lighted 
thoroughfares  the  police  do  not  allow  them  to 
stop  and  accost  men,  but  they  manage  to  do  so. 
The  neighobrhoods  of  the  "hotels"  and  the  places 
of  "amusement"  are  their  principal  cruising 
grounds,  and  their  victims  are  mainly  strangers 
to  the  city.  Many  of  them  have  regular  employ- 
ment during  the  day,  and  ply  their  wretched  trade 
at  night  to  increase  their  gains.  They  accompany 
their  victims  to  the  "bed-houses"  which  are  con- 
veniently at  hand,  and  if  an  opportunity  occurs 
will  rob  him.  They  frequent  the  dance  halls  and 
concert  saloons ;  in  fact,  every  place  to  which  they 
can  obtain  admission,  arc!  lure  men  into  their  com- 
pany. As  a  rule  they  are  vicious  in  the  extreme, 
drink  heavily,  and  in  some  cases  are  fearfully 
diseased. 

xn  former  years  many  of  the   street  walkers 


138 


CHICAGO 

were  in  the  regular  employ  of  the  ' '  panel-houses, ' ' 
which  were  numerous  at  that  time.  These  houses 
were  kept  by  men,  who  were  among  the  most 
desparate  roughs  in  Chicago.  The  woman  is  either 
mistress  of  one  of  these  men,  or  in  his  pay.  The 
method  pursued  was  as  follows :  The  street  walker 
secures  her  victim  on  the  street,  or  at  some  con- 
cert hall,  or  dance-house.  He  is  generally  a 
stranger,  and  ignorant  of  the  localities  of  the  city. 
She  takes  him  to  her  room,  which  is  an  apartment 
provided  with  a  partition  in  which  there  is  a  slid- 
ing door  or  panel.  The  confederate  of  the  woman 
is  connealed  behind  the  partition,  and  at  a  favor- 
able moment  slides  back  the  panel,  enters  the 
room  and  strips  the  clothing  of  the  victim  of  the 
money  and  valuables  contained  in  it.  If  discov- 
ered, the  panel  thief  endeavors  to  disable  the 
victim.  The  latter  is  no  match  for  his  assailant, 
and  is  from  the  first  at  a  disadvantage.  The  thief 
is  desperate,  and  is  generally  armed*  He  does 
not  hesitate  at  anything,  and,  if  necessary,  will 
murder  the  victim,  the  woman  assisting  him  in 
the  fearful  work.  Then  the  body  is  left  until 
near  morning,  when  it  is  placed  in  a  wagon  en- 
gaged by  the  thief,  carried  to  the  river  or  lak®. 


CHICAGO 

and  then  thrown  into  the  water.  Generally  the 
robbery  is  accomplished  without  the  necessity  of 
resorting  to  violence.  The  victim  either  puts  up 
with  his  loss  in  silence,  or  reports  it  to  the  police. 
The  records  at  headquarters  contain  reports  of 
numerous  robberies  of  this  kind.  So  the  evil  went 
on.  Strangers  in  this  city  incur  terrible  risk  in 
accompanying  street  walkers,  and  women  whom 
they  meet  on  the  street,  at  concert  and  dance 
halls  to  their  homes.  In  nine  cases  out  of  ten, 
robbery  is  certain.  Murder  is  too  often  the  re- 
sult of  such  adventure.  Truly,  Solomon  was  wise 
indeed  when  he  wrote :  "He  hath  taken  a  bag  of 
money  with  him — with  her  much  fair  speech  she 
caused  him  to  yield,  with  flattering  of  her  lips  she 
forced  him — he  goeth  after  her  straightway,  as 
an  ox  goeth  to  the  slaughter,  or  as  a  fool  to  the 
correction  of  the  stocks ;  till  a  dart  strike  through 
his  liver;  as  a  bird  hastened  to  the  snare,  and 
knoweth  not  it  is  for  his  life — her  house  is  the  wa> 
to  hell  going  down  to  the  chambers  of  death.'* 


Chicago's  Crowning  Curse 

The  curse  of  Chicago  is  the  vile,  repugnant 
saloon.  No  one  can  realize  the  picture  of  its  rot- 
tenness all  at  once ;  everything  is  deceptive  about 
it,  and  it  takes  time  to  grasp  the  magnitude  of 
this  hydra-headed  monster.  But  by  degrees  the 
immensity  and  appalling  environments  assert 
themselves,  and  the  beholder,  while  visiting  these 
pest  holes,  feels  and  knows  that  he  is  in  close 
proximity  to  the  devil.  The  very  atmosphere 
seems  laden  with  his  satanic  majesty's  presence, 
which  permeates  every  nook  and  corner  of  the 
iniquitous  place.  Here,  above  all  other  places,  the 
devil's  work  is  supreme.  Awful,  indeed,  is  the 
anguish  of  the  mother  as  she  looks  upon  the  face 
of  her  ruined  son  or  daughter. 

Oh !  Chicago !  big,  bustling  Chicago !  Storms 
and  tempests  may  rage  around,  and  the  sun's 
fierce  rays  descend  upon  your  brow ;  you  may  be 
victorious  in  commercial  conflict,  but  sink  into  in- 


141 


CHICAGO 

significance  when  facing  the  greatest  of  social 
evils. 

There  are,  however,  no  rivais  among  these  dan- 
gerous dives,  which  stand  out  like  projecting 
rocks  as  pitfalls  for  the  weak. 

There  are  about  7,000  saloons  in  Chicago.  At 
each  of  these  places  liquors  are  sold  by  the  single 
glass  or  drink.  They  represent  every  grade  of 
drinking  establishments,  from  the  magnificent 
Buffet  to  the  "  Barrel-houses. "  All  these  places 
enjoy  a  greater  or  less  degree  of  prosperity,  and 
the  proprietors  grow  rich,  unless  they  cut  short 
their  lives  by  becoming  their  own  best  customers. 
For  alcoholic  and  malt  liquors  served  over  the  bar 
hundreds  of  thousands  of  dollars  are  spent  daily. 
It  is  estimated  that  in  the  vicinity  of  the  board  of 
trade  7,500  drinks  are  disposed  of  every  day.  The 
"bulls  and  bears "  require  heavy  stimulants  to 
keep  them  up  to  their  exciting  work,  and  their 
daily  expenditure  for  such  purposes  is  about 
$2,500.  Probably  this  may  account  for  some  of 
the  queer  scenes  to  be  witnessed  in  the  pit. 

The  quantity  of  beer  consumed  in  the  city  is 
about  twelve  times  that  of  whisky,  and  is  the 
most  common  of  the  alcoholic  drinks.  The  true- 


142 


CHICAGO 

blooded  German  beer  drinker  will  consume  from 
one  to  two  dozen  glasses  of  his  favorite  beverage 
in  twenty-four  hours  and  his  American  and  other 
imitators  follow  closely  in  his  footsteps. 

A  popular  bar  will  take  in  $200  to  $400  a  day, 
but  the  majority  of  the  liquor  dealers  are  content 
with  from  $30  to  $50  a  day.  Some  of  these  places 
remain  open  all  night,  and  are  filled  with  dram 
drinkers  at  all  hours.  At  the  first-class  establish- 
ments the  liquors  sold  are  of  good  quality,  but 
as  the  scale  is  descended  the  quality  of  the  drinks 
fall  off,  until  the  low-class  bar-rooms  are  reached 
in  which  the  most  poisonous  compounds  are  sold, 
under  the  name  of  whisky,  brandy,  gin  and  rum. 

The  American  saloon  is  the  curse  of  the  nation. 
Hundreds  of  thousands  of  men  and  women  are 
being  ruined  annually,  and  our  government,  it 
seems,  is  powerless  to  curb  the  destroying  monster. 

There  are  over  1400  girls  in  the  training  school 
for  girls,  and  with  few  exceptions  they  have  been 
children  of  an  alcoholic  inheritance.  Are  they  to 
be  blamed  for  the  circumstances  surrounding  their 
young  lives?  Not  at  all.  The  whole  blame  lies 
at  the  door  of  those  who  have  voted  to  license  the 
saloon  which  has  made  it  possible  for  the  parents 


143 


CHICAGO 

to  so  poison  their  physical  being  that  it  is  not  pos- 
sible for  them  to  bring  into  the  world  normal 
children  with  the  powers  that  would  enable  them 
to  cope  with  the  world. 

The  number  of  moral  imbeciles  that  are  in  the 
state  institutions  is  simply  appalling,  and  there 
are  object  lessons  enough  in  Chicago  to  cause  any 
one  who  will  give  the  subject  but  a  moment  of 
good,  unselfish  thought,  to  go  to  the  polls  and  de- 
clare that  no  longer  shall  be  fostered  in  our  midst 
that  which  in  the  course  of  time  will  make  us 
no  better  than  a  nation  of  lepers.  Some  day 
parents  will  recognize  the  responsibility  of  bring- 
ing children  into  the  world. 

The  American  woman  of  the  fashionable  set 
lives  in  a  whirl  of  unhealthful  stress  and  excite- 
ment. She  sleeps  too  little  and  keeps  her  nerves 
constantly  on  the  Qui  Vive.  She  tipples  and 
drugs,  she  is  often  a  degenerate  and  a  mother  of 
degenerates — if,  indeed,  she  be  a  mother  at  all. 
This  drinking  among  women  is  more  prevalent 
than  we  are  willing  to  believe,  and  it  is  one  of 
the  greatest  dangers  with  which  we  are  confronted 
today.  The  hurry  and  fret  of  Chicago  life  itf 


144 


CHICAGO 

turning  out  degenerates  at  a  rate  that  will  one 
day  stagger  the  world. 

Ignorance  and  bad  parentage  are  doing  the 
work  in  many  instances,  and  girls  comparatively 
good  are  led  off  by  bad  men  and  worse  women. 
Children  who  have  been  well  born  and  should 
have  been  well  reared,  find  their  way  into  the 
schools  of  delinquents,  the  jails,  penitentiaries, 
and  insane  hospitals.  The  heredity  of  many  of 
these  children  is  appalling  and  the  environments 
does  the  rest. 

The  "barrel-houses"  are  located  in  the  poorer 
sections  of  the  city  where  the  liquors  of  the  vilest 
kind  are  sold.  Their  customers  are  the  poor  and 
wretched.  Only  the  cheapest  and  poisonous 
liquors  are  sold  here  as  a  rule. 

It  is  impossible  to  estimate  the  amount  of 
drunkenness  in  Chicago.  The  arrests  represent 
but  a  small  part  of  it,  as  thousands  upon  thou- 
sands of  habitual  drunkards  manage  to  keep  out 
of  the  hands  of  the  police.  Respectable  men 
patronize  the  bar-rooms  regularly,  and  are  con- 
stantly seen  reeling  along  the  streets.  So  long  as 
they  are  not  helpless,  or  guilty  of  disorderly  con- 

145 


CHICAGO 

duct,  the  police  do  not  molest  them.  Systematic 
drinking,  which  does  not  amount  to  actual  intoxi- 
cation, but  kills  by  slow  degrees,  is  very  common. 
Among  the  most  liberal  patrons  of  the  bar-rooms 
are  young  men  and  even  boys,  who  thoughtlessly 
begin  their  careers  that  will  one  day  end  in 
sorrow. 

Drunkenness  is  by  no  means  confined  to  men. 
Women  are  largely  addicted  to  it.  Out  of  some 
twelve  arrests  for  this  cause  three  are  women. 
In  the  more  wretched  quarters  of  the  city,  women 
drink  heavily  and  are  among  the  most  constant 
customers  of  the  cheap  groggeries  which  thrive 
among  the  poor.  Even  women  of  respectability 
and  good  social  positions  are  guilty  of  the  vice 
of  intemperance.  They  all  do  not  frequent  bar- 
rooms, however,  but  obtain  liquor  at  the  restau- 
rants patronized  by  them,  and  it  is  a  common 
sight  to  see  well-dressed  women,  married  and 
single,  rise  from  a  restaurant  table  under  the 
influence  of  intoxicating  drink. 

The  poem  of  Francis  E.  Bolton,  tells  the  story 
of  the  rum  demon. 

Within  a  home  of  woe  and  shame, 
145 


CHICAGO 

A  drunken  father  nightly  came, 

And  called  the  only  child  he  had, 

To  come  and  kiss  her  poor  old  dad. 

A  darling  little  girl  was  she, 

Who  climbed  upon  that  father's  knee, 

And  kissed  him  with  a  look  half  sad, 

Although  she  loved  her  poor  old  dad. 

Drunken  and  dirty,  weary  and  sad, 

She  always  kissed  her  poor  old  dad. 

But  lower,  lower  sank  his  soul, 

Infatuated  with  the  bowl, 

One  comfort  only  then  he  had, 

The  kiss  that  always  welcomed  dad. 

One  night  a  Christian  brother  came, 

And  won  him  from  his  woe  and  shame, 

He  found  the  Lord,  who  made  him  glad, 

That  night  she  kissed  a  sober  dad. 

Days  came  and  went,  his  eyes  grew  bright, 

His  clothes  were  neat,  his  heart  was  light, 

His  home  was  heaven,  his  child  was  glad, 

Some  marvelous  change  had  come  to  dad. 

One  night  he  called  her  as  of  yore, 

As  she  stood  white-robed  upon  the  floor, 

His  tone  a  deeper  loving  had, 

"Come,  pet,  and  kiss  your  poor  old  dad." 

U7 


CHICAGO 

Loyal  and  loving,  manly  and  glad, 
She  knew  some  change  had  come  to  dad. 
Her  eyes  lit  with  a  radient  smile, 
She  paused  in  thought  a  little  while, 
She  said  as  slow  as  she  looked  him  o'er, 
"You're  not  my  old  dad  any  more." 
"What  then,  my  pet?"  he  asked  with  awe, 
"Why,  now  you  are  my  new  papa." 

He  caught  her  to  his  breast  with  praise, 
"So  may  I  be  through  endless  days." 
Loyal  and  loving,  noble  and  true, 
Praise  to  the  Lord,  old  dad  is  new, 
0,  glorious  grace  of  God!  'tis  here, 
For  those  who  sigh  in  sin  and  fear. 
Come  unto  Christ  who  can  restore, 
Nor  be  the  old  man  any  more. 

In  Jesus  Christ  the  world  is  true, 
You  are  a  creature  wholly  new. 
The  blessed  spirit  now  implore, 
Nor  be  the  old  man  any  more. 
Loyal  and  loving,  noble  and  true, 
The  soul  that  lives  in  Christ  is  new. 

148 


A  Farewell  to  Innocence 

The  first  cause  of  parental  solicitude, 
I  think,  arises  from  the  imperfection  of 
parents  on  their  own  part.  We  all  some- 
how want  our  children  to  avoid  our 
faults.  We  hope  if  we  have  any  excel- 
lencies they  will  copy  them;  but  the 
probability  is  they  will  copy  our  faults, 
and  omit  our  excellencies.  Children  are 
very  apt  to  be  echoes  of  the  parental 
life.  Someone  meets  a  lad  in  the  back 
street,  finds  him  smoking,  and  says: 
"Why,  I  am  astonished  at  you;  what 
would  your  father  say  if  he  knew  this? 
Where  did  you  get  that  cigar?"  "Oh,  I 
picked  it  up  on  the  street."  "What 
would  your  father  say,  and  your  mother 
say,  if  they  knew  this?"  "Oh,  he  re- 
plies, "that's  nothing,  my  father  smokes !" 
There  is  not  one  of  us  to-day  who  would 
like  to  have  our  children  copy  all  our 
example.  And  this  is  the  cause  of  so- 
licitude on  the  part  of  all  of  us. 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

Then  solicitude  arises  from  our  con- 
scious insufficiency  and  unwisdom  of 
discipline.  Out  of  twenty  parents  there 
may  be  one  parent  who  understands 
how  thoroughly  and  skillfully  to  disci- 
pline; perhaps  not  more  than  one  out  of 
twenty.  We,  nearly  all  of  us,  are  on 
one  side  or  are  on  the  other. 

Here  is  a  father  who  says :  "I  am  go- 
ing to  bring  up  my  children  right;  my 
sons  shall  know  nothing  but  religion,  and 
hear  nothing  but  religion."  They  are 
routed  at  6  o'clock  in  the  morning  to  re- 
cite the  Ten  Commandments.  They  are 
awakened  up  from  the  sofa  on  Sunday 
night  to  recite  the  Westminster  cate- 
chism. Their  bedroom  walls  are  cov- 
ered with  religious  pictures  and  quota- 
tions of  Scripture,  and  when  the  boy 
looks  for  the  day  of  the  month  he  looks 
for  it  in  a  religious  almanac.  If  a  min- 
ister comes  to  the  house  he  is  requested 
to  take  the  boy  aside,  and  tell  him  what 
a  great  sinner  he  is.  It  is  religion  morn- 
iag,  noon  and  night. 
H 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

Time  passes  on,  and  the  parents  arc 
awaiting  for  the  return  of  the  son  at 
night.  It  is  9  o'clock,  it  is  10  o'clock,  it 
is  11  o'clock,  it  is  12  o'clock,  it  is  half  past 
12  o'clock.  Then  they  hear  the  rattling 
of  the  night  key,  and  George  comes  in 
and  hastens  upstairs  lest  he  be  accosted. 
His  father  says:  "George,  where  have 
you  been  ?"  He  says :  "I  have  been  out." 
Yes,  he  has  been  out,  and  he  has  been 
down,  and  he  has  started  on  the  broad 
road  to  ruin  for  this  life  and  ruin  for 
tke  life  to  come,  and  the  father  says  to 
his  wife:  "Mother,  the  Ten  Command- 
ments are  a  failure;  no  use  of  West- 
minster Catechism;  I  have  done  my 
very  best  for  that  boy ;  just  see  how  he 
has  turned  out."  Ah!  my  friend,  you 
stuffed  that  boy  with  religion,  you  had 
no  sympathy  with  innocent  hilarities,  you 
had  no  common  sense. 

A  man  of  mid-life  said  to  me:  "I 
haven't  much  desire  for  religion;  my 
father  was  as  good  a  man  as  ever  lived, 
but  he  jammed  religion  down  my  throat 

63 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

when  I  was  a  boy  until  I  got  disgusted 
with  it,  and  I  haven't  wanted  any  of  it 
since."  That  father  erred  on  one  side. 

Then  the  discipline  is  an  entire  fail- 
ure in  many  households  because  the 
father  pulls  one  way  and  the  mother 
pulls  the  other  way.  The  father  says: 
"My  son,  I  told  you  if  I  ever  found  you 
guilty  of  falsehood  again  I  would  chas- 
tise you,  and  I  am  going  to  keep  my 
promise."  The  mother  says:  "Don't; 
let  him  off  this  time." 

A  father  says:  "I  have  seen  so  many 
that  make  mistakes  by  too  great  severity 
in  the  rearing  of  their  children;  now,  I 
will  let  my  boy  do  as  he  pleases ;  he  shall 
have  full  swing;  here,  my  son,  are  tick- 
ets to  the  theatre  and  opera ;  if  you  want 
to  play  cards,  do  so ;  if  you  do  not  want 
to  play  cards  you  need  not  play  them ;  go 
when  you  want  to,  and  come  when  you 
want  to;  have  a  good  time;  go  it!" 
Plenty  of  money  for  the  most  part,  and 
give  a  boy  plenty  of  money,  and  ask 
him  not  what  he  does  with  it,  and  you 
64 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

pay  hit  way  straight  to  perdition.  But 
after  a  while  the  lad  thinks  he  ought  to 
have  a  larger  supply.  He  has  been 
treated,  and  he  must  treat.  He  must 
have  wine  suppers.  There  are  larger 
and  larger  expenses. 

After  a  while,  one  day  a  messenger 
from  the  bank  over  the  way  calls  in  and 
says  to  the  father  of  the  household,  "The 
officers  of  the  bank  would  like  to  have 
you  step  over  a  minute."  The  father 
steps  over  and  the  bank  officer  says :  "Is 
that  your  check  ?"  "No,"  he  says,  "that 
is  not  my  check ;  I  never  make  an  *H'  in 
that  way;  that  is  not  my  writing;  that 
is  not  my  signature;  that  is  a  counter- 
feit; send  for  the  police."  "Stop,"  says 
the  bank  officer,  "your  son  wrote  that." 

Now  the  father  and  mother  are  wait- 
ing for  the  son  to  come  home  at  night. 
It  is  12  o'clock,  it  is  half-past  12  o'clock, 
it  is  1  o'clock.  The  son  comes  through 
the  hallway.  The  father  says ;  "My  son, 
what  does  all  this  mean?  I  gave  you 
every  opportunity,  I  gave  you  all  the 

55 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

money  you  wanted,  and  here  in  my  old 
days  I  find  that  you  have  become  a 
spendthrift,  a  libertine,  and  a  sot."  The 
son  says:  "Now,  father,  what  is  the 
use  of  your  talking  that  way  ?  You  told 
me  to  go  it,  and  I  just  took  your  sugges- 
tion." And  so  to  strike  the  medium  be- 
tween severity  and  too  great  leniency,  to 
strike  the  happy  medium  between  the 
two  and  to  train  for  God  and  for  heaven, 
is  the  anxiety  of  every  intelligent  parent. 
Another  great  anxiety,  great  solici- 
tude, is  in  the  fact  that  so  early  is  de- 
veloped childish  sinfulness.  Morning 
glories  put  out  their  bloom  in  the  early 
part  of  the  day,  but  as  the  hot  sun  comes 
on  they  close  up.  While  there  are  other 
flowers  that  blaze  their  beauty  along  the 
Amazon  for  a  week  at  a  time  without 
closing,  yet  the  morning  glory  does  its 
work  as  certainly  as  the  sun  shines;  so 
there  are  some  children  that  just  put 
forth  their  bloom,  and  they  close,  and 
they  are  gone.  There  is  something  su- 
pernatural about  them  while  they  iarry, 
N 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

and  there  is  an  ethereal  appearance  about 
them.  There  is  a  wonderful  depth  to 
their  eye,  and  they  are  gone.  They  are 
too  delicate  a  plant  for  this  world.  The 
Heavenly  Gardener  sees  them  and  He 
takes  them  in. 

But  for  the  most  part,  the  children 
that  live  sometimes  get  cross,  and  pick 
up  bad  words  in  the  street,  or  are  dis- 
posed to  quarrel  with  brother  or  sister, 
and  show  that  they  are  wicked.  You 
see  them  in  the  Sabbath-school  class. 
They  are  so  sunshiny  and  bright  you 
would  think  they  were  always  so;  but 
the  mother,  looking  over  at  them,  re- 
members what  an  awful  time  she  had  in 
getting  them  ready.  Time  passes  on. 
They  get  considerably  older,  and  the  son 
comes  in  from  the  %street,  from  a  pugi- 
listic encounter,  bearing  on  his  coun- 
tenance marks  of  defeat,  or  the  daugh- 
ter practices  some  little  deception  in  the 
household.  The  mother  says:  "I 
can't  always  be  scolding,  and  fretting, 
and  finding  fault,  but  this  must  be  stop- 
67 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

ped."  So  in  many  a  household  there  is 
the  sign  of  sin,  the  sign  of  the  heart's 
being  wrong,  the  sign  of  truthfulness  of 
what  the  Bible  says  when  it  declares, 
"They  go  astray  as  soon  as  they  are 
born,  speaking  lies." 

Some  go  to  work,  and  try  to  correct 
all  this,  and  the  boy  is  picked  at,  and 
picked  at,  and  picked  at.  That  always 
is  ruinous.  There  is  more  good  help  in 
one  good  thunderstorm,  than  in  five 
days  of  cold  drizzle.  Better  the  old- 
fashioned  kind  of  chastisement,  if  that 
be  necessary,  than  the  fretting,  and  the 
scolding,  which  have  destroyed  so  many. 

There  is  also  the  cause  of  great  solici- 
tude sometimes  because  our  young  peo- 
ple are  surrounded  by  so  many  tempta- 
tions. A  castle  may  not  be  taken  by  a 
straightforward  siege,  but  suppose  there 
be  inside  the  castle  an  enemy,  and  in  the 
night  he  shoves  back  the  bolt,  and 
swings  open  the  door?  Our  young  folk 
have  foes  without,  and  they  have  foes 
within.  Who  does  not  understand  it? 

68 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

Who  is  the  man  who  is  not  aware  of 
the  fact  that  the  young  people  of  this 
day  have  tremendous  temptations? 

Some  man  will  come  to  the  young  peo- 
ple, and  try  and  persuade  them  that 
purity,  and  honesty,  and  uprighteous- 
ness  are  a  sign  of  weakness.  Some  man 
will  take  a  dramatic  attitude,  and  he 
will  talk  to  the  young  man,  and  he  will 
say:  "You  must  break  away  from  your 
mother's  apronstring;  you  must  get  out 
of  the  Puritanical  straight-jacket;  it  is 
time  you  were  your  own  master;  you 
are  verdant ;  you  are  green ;  you  are  un- 
sophisticated;  come  with  me,  I'll  show 
you  the  world ;  it  won't  hurt  you."  Af- 
ter a  while  the  young  man  says,  "Well,  I 
can't  afford  to  be  odd,  I  can't  afford  to 
be  peculiar,  I  can't  afford  to  sacrifice  all 
my  friends ;  I'll  just  go  see  for  myself." 
Farwell  to  innocence,  which  once  gone, 
never  fully  comes  back.  Do  not  be  un- 
der the  delusion  that  because  you  re- 
pent of  your  sin  you  get  rid  forever  of 
its  consequences.  I  say  farewell  to  in- 
li 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

nocence,  which  once  gone  never   fully 
comes  back. 

Oh,  how  many  traps  set  for  the  young ! 
Styles  of  temptation  just  suited  to  them. 
Do  you  suppose  that  a  man  who  went 
clear  to  the  depths  of  dissipation,  went 
down  in  one  great  plunge?  Oh,  no!  At 
first  it  was  a  fashionable  hotel.  Marble 
floor.  No  unclean  pictures  behind  the 
counter.  No  drunken  hiccough  while 
they  drink,  but  the  click  of  cut  glass  to 
the  elegant  sentiment.  You  ask  that 
young  man  now  to  go  into  some  low  res- 
taurant, and  get  a  drink,  and  he  would 
say,  "Do  you  mean  to  insult  me?"  But 
the  fashionable  and  elegant  hotel  is  not 
always  close  by,  and  now  the  young  man 
is  on  the  down  grade.  Further  and  fur- 
ther down  until  he  has  about  struck  the 
bottom  of  the  depths  of  ruin.  Now,  he 
is  in  the  low  restaurant.  The  cards  so 
greasy  you  can  hardly  tell  who  has  the 
best  hand.  Gambling  for  drinks.  Shuf- 
fle away,  shuffle  away.  The  devil's  agent 
stands  in  his  shirt-sleeves,  wjth  his 
€0 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

hands  on  his  hips,  waiting  for  an  order 
to  fill  up  the  glasses. 

The  clock  strikes  twelve — the  tolling 
of  the  funeral  bell  of  a  lost  soul.  The 
breath  of  eternal  woe  flushes  in  that 
young  man's  cheek.  In  the  jets  of  the 
gaslight  the  fiery  tongue  of  the  worm 
that  never  dies.  Two  o'clock  in  the 
morning,  and  now  they  are  fast  asleep 
in  their  chairs.  Landlord  conies  around 
and  says,  "Wake  up,  wake  up!  time  to 
shut  up !"  "What !"  says  the  young  man. 
"Time  to  shut  up."  Push  them  all  out 
into  the  night  air.  Now  they  are  going 
home.  Going  home!  Let  the  wife 
crouch  in  the  corner  and  the  children 
hide  under  the  bed.  What  was  the  his- 
tory of  that  young  man?  He  began  his 
dissipation  in  the  barroom  of  a  gilded 
hotel,  and  completed  his  damnation  in 
the  lowest  grog-shop. 

Sometimes  sin  docs  not  halt  in  that 
way.  Sometimes  sin  even  comes  to  the 
drawing-room.  There  are  leprous 
hearts  sometimes  admitted  to  the  high- 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

est  circles  of  society.  He  is  so  elegant, 
he  is  so  bewitching  in  his  manner,  he 
is  so  refined,  he  is  so  educated,  no  one 
suspects  the  sinful  design,  but  after  a 
while  the  sinful  talons  of  death  come 
forth.  What  is  the  matter  with  the 
house?  The  front  windows  have  not 
been  opened  for  six  months  or  a  year. 
A  shadow  has  come  down  on  the  do- 
mestic hearth,  a  shadow  thicker  than 
one  woven  of  midnight  and  hurricane. 
The  agony  of  that  parent  makes  him 
say:  "Oh,  I  wish  I  had  buried  my  chil- 
dren when  they  were  small!"  Loss  of 
property?  No.  Death  in  the  family? 
No.  Madness  ?  No.  Some  villain,  kid- 
gloved  and  diamonded,  lifted  that  cup  of 
domestic  bliss  until  the  sunlight  struck 
it,  and  all  the  rainbows  played  around 
the  rim,  and  then  dashed  it  to  desola- 
tion and  woe,  until  the  harpies  of  dark- 
ness dapped  their  hands  and  all  the 
voices  of  the  pit  uttered  a  loud 
"Hal  ha!" 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

The  statistic  has  never  been  made  up 
in  these  great  cities  of  how  many  have 
been  destroyed,  and  how  many  beautiful 
homes  have  been  overthrown.  If  the 
statistic  could  be  presented,  it  would 
freeze  your  blood  in  a  solid  cake  at  your 
heart.  Our  great  cities  are  full  of  temp- 
tations, and  to  vast  multitudes  of  parents 
these  temptations  become  a  matter  of 
great  solicitude. 

But  now  for  the  alleviations.  First  of 
all,  you  save  yourself  a  great  deal  of 
trouble,  parent,  if  you  can  early  watch 
the  children  and  educate  them  for  a  no- 
bler and  purer  life. 

A  vessel  puts  out  to  sea,  and  after 
it  has  been  five  days  out  there  comes  a 
cyclone.  The  vessel  springs  a  leak.  The 
helm  will  not  work.  What  is  the  mat- 
ter ?  It  is  not  seaworthy.  It  never  was 
seaworthy.  Can  you  mend  it  now?  It 
is  too  late.  Down  she  goes  with  all  on 
board  into  a  watery  grave.  What  was 
the  time  to  fix  that  vessel?  What  was 
the  time  to  prepare  it  for  the  storm  ?  In 

68 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

the  dry  dock.  Ah,  dear  parent,  do  not 
wait  until  your  children  get  out  into 
the  world,  beyond  the  narrows  and  out 
on  the  voyage  of  life!  It  is  too  late 
then  to  mend  their  morals  and  their 
manners.  The  dry  dock  of  the  Chris- 
tian home  is  the  place.  Correct  the  evil 
now. 

Just  look  at  the  character  of  your 
children  now  and  get  an  intimation  of 
what  they  are  going  to  be.  You  can 
tell  by  the  way  that  boy  divides  the  ap- 
ple what  his  proclivity  is  and  what  his 
sin  will  be,  and  what  style  of  discipline 
you  ought  to  bring  upon  him.  You  let 
that  disposition  go.  You  see  how  he 
divides  the  apple?  He  takes  nine-tenths 
of  it  for  himself,  and  he  gives  one-tenth 
to  his  sister.  Well,  let  that  go,  and  all 
his  life  he  will  want  the  best  part  of 
everything,  and  he  will  be  grinding  and 
grasping  to  the  day  of  his  death.  Be- 
gin early  with  your  children.  You  stand 
on  the  banks  of  a  river  and  you  try  to 
change  its  course.  It  has  been  rolling 
II 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

now  for  a  hundred  miles.  You  cannot 
change  it.  But  just  go  to  the  source  of 
that  river,  go  to  where  the  water  just 
drips  down  upon  the  rock.  Then  with 
your  knife  make  a  channel  this  way  and 
a  channel  that  way,  and  it  will  take  it. 
Come  out  and  stand  on  the  banks  of 
your  child's  life  when  it  is  thirty  or 
forty  years  of  age,  or  even  twenty,  and 
try  to  change  the  course  of  that  life. 
It  is  too  late!  It  is  too  late!  Go  fur- 
ther up  at  the  source  of  life  and  nearest 
to  the  mother's  heart  where  the  charac- 
ter starts,  and  try  to  take  in  the  right 
direction. 

But  oh,  dear  friend,  be  careful  to  make 
a  line,  a  distinct  line,  between  innocent 
hilarity  on  the  one  hand  and  vicious  pro- 
clivity on  the  other.  Do  not  think  your 
children  are  going  to  ruin  because  they 
make  a  racket.  All  healthy  children 
make  a  racket.  But  do  not  laugh  at 
your  child's  sin  because  it  is  smart.  If 
you  do,  you  will  cry  after  a  while  be- 
cause it  is  vicious.  Rebuke  the  first  ap- 
es 


A  FAREWELL  TO  INNOCENCE 

pearance  of  sin.   Now  is  your  time.  Do 
not  begin  too  late. 

Remember  it  is  what  you  do  more 
than  what  you  say  that  is  going  to  af- 
fect your  children.  Do  you  suppose 
Noah's  family  would  have  gone  into  the 
ark  if  he  had  staid  out?  No.  His  sons 
would  have  said:  "I  am  not  going  into 
the  boat;  there's  something  wrong; 
father  won't  go  in:  if  father  stays  out, 
I'll  stay  out."  An  officer  may  stand  in 
a  castle  and  look  off  upon  an  army  fight- 
ing ;  but  he  cannot  be  much  of  an  officer, 
he  cannot  excite  much  enthusiasm  on  the 
part  of  his  troops,  standing  in  a  castle 
or  on  a  hill-top  looking  off  upon  the 
fight.  It  is  he  who  leaps  into  the  stir- 
rups and  dashes  ahead  that  wins  the 
battle.  And  you  stand  outside  the 
Christian  life  and  tell  your  children  to 
go  in.  They  will  not  go.  But  you  dash 
on  ahead,  and  they  themselves  will  be- 
come good  soldiers.  Lead  on,  if  you 
would  have  them  follow. 


The  Gates  of  Hell 

You  know  all  about  the  gates  of  heav- 
en. You  have  often  heard  them 
preached  about.  There  are  three  to  each 
point  of  the  compass.  On  the  north, 
three  gates;  on  the  south,  three  gates; 
on  the  east,  three  gates;  on  the  west, 
three  gates;  and  each  gate  is  a  solid 
pearl.  Oh,  gate  of  heaven,  may  we  all  get 
into  it.  But  who  shall  describe  the  gates 
of  hell  ?  These  gates  are  burnished  until 
they  sparkle  and  glisten  in  the  gaslight. 
They  are  mighty,  and  set  in  sockets  of 
deep  and  dreadful  masonry.  They  are 
high,  so  that  those  who  are  in  may  not 
clamber  over  and  get  out.  They  are 
heavy,  but  they  swing  easily  in  to  let 
those  go  in  who  are  to  be  destroyed. 

If  you  will  stand  with  me  for  a  few 
moments  on  any  prominent  thorough- 
fare in  any  city  of  the  world,  you  will 
witness  scenes  that  the  painter  cannot 
67 


THE   GATES   OF   HELL 

paint,  that  the  artist  cannot  draw,  that 
writers  cannot  describe.  But  we  shall 
not  stand  looking  at  the  outside  of  the 
gates  of  hell.  I  intend  to  tell  you  of 
both  sides,  and  I  shall  tell  you  what  those 
gates  are  made  of.  With  the  hammer  of 
God's  truth  I  shall  pound  on  the  brazen 
panels,  and  with  the  lantern  of  God's 
truth  I  shall  flash  a  light  upon  the  shin- 
ing hinges. 

Gate  the  first:  The  influence  of  Clubs. 
— Cattle  in  herds.  Birds  in  flocks.  Fish 
in  schools.  The  human  race  in  social 
circles.  You  may  discharge  a  gun  and 
scatter  the  flock  of  quails,  and  you  may 
by  plunge  of  the  anchor  send  apart  the 
denizens  of  the  deep ;  but  they  will  reas- 
semble. And  if  by  some  power  you  could 
scatter  all  the  present  associations  of 
men,  they  would  again  reassemble. 

Herbs  and  flowers  prefer  to  stand  in 

associations.     You  plant  a   for-get-me- 

not  or  a  heart's-ease  away  up  alone  on 

the  hillside,  and  it  will  soon  hunt  up  some 

fit 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

other  heart's-ease  or  for-get-me-not 
You  find  the  herbs  talking  to  each  other 
in  the  morning  dew.  Once  in  a  while 
you  find  a  man  unsympathetic  and  alone, 
and  like  a  ship's  mast,  ice-glazed,  which 
the  most  agile  sailor  could  not  climb; 
but  the  most  of  men  have  in  their  nature 
a  thousand  roots  and  a  thousand  branch- 
es, and  they  blossom  all  the  way  to  the 
top,  and  the  fowls  of  heaven  sing  amid 
the  branches.  Because  of  this  we  have 
communities  and  societies — some  for  the 
kindling  of  mirth,  some  for  the  raising 
of  sociality,  some  for  the  advance  of 
craft,  some  to  plan  for  the  welfare  of 
State — associations  of  artists,  of  mer- 
chants, of  shipwrights,  of  carpenters,  of 
masons,  of  plumbers,  of  plasterers,  of 
lawyers,  of  doctors,  of  clergymen.  Do  you 
cry  out  against  this?  Then  you  cry  out 
against  a  divine  arrangement. 

You  might  as  well  preach  a  sermon 
to  a  busy  ant-hill  or  bee-hive  as  against 
secret  societies.  In  many  of  the  ages 

69 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

people  have  gathered  together  in  associa- 
tions, characterized  by  the  blunt  old  Sax- 
on designation  of  Club.  Some  to  ad- 
vance art,  some  to  vindicate  justice,  some 
to  promote  good  literature,  some  to  de- 
stroy the  body  and  blast  the  soul.  In 
our  own  time  we  have  many  clubs.  They 
are  as  different  from  each  other  as  the 
day  from  the  night.  I  might  show  you 
two  specimens. 

Here  is  the  imperial  hallway.  On  this 
side  is  the  parlor,  with  the  upholstery  of 
a  Kremlin  or  a  Tuilleries.  Here  is  a 
dining-room  which  challenges  you  to 
mention  any  luxury  it  cannot  afford. 
Here  is  an  art  gallery  with  pictures  and 
statues  and  drawings  from  the  best  of 
artists — pictures  for  all  moods,  impas- 
sioned or  placid — Sheridan's  Ride  and 
Farmers  at  their  Nooning.  Shipwreck 
and  Sunlight  over  the  Seas.  Foaming 
deer  with  hounds  after  it  in  the  Adiron- 
dacks.  Sheep  on  the  Hillside.  And  here 
are  reading  rooms  with  the  finest  of  mag- 

70 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

azines,  and  libraries  with  all  styles  of 
books.  Men  go  there  for  ten  minutes  or 
for  many  hours.  Some  come  from  beau- 
tiful and  happy  home  circles  for  a  little 
while  that  they  may  enter  into  these 
club  house  societies.  Others  come  from 
dismembered  households,  and  while  they 
have  humble  lodgings  elsewhere,  find 
their  chief  joy  here.  One  blackball  amid 
ten  votes  will  defeat  a  man's  member- 
ship. For  rowdyism  and  gambling  and 
drunkenness  and  every  style  of  misde- 
meanor a  man  is  immediately  dropped 
Brilliant  club  house  from  top  to  bottom 
— the  chandeliers,  the  plate,  the  litera- 
ture the  social  prestige  a  complete  en- 
chantment. 

Here  is  another  club-house.  You  open 
the  door  and  the  fumes  of  strong  drink 
and  tobacco  are  something  almost  in- 
tolerable. You  do  not  have  to  ask  what 
those  young  men  are  doing,  for  you  can 
see  by  the  flushed  cheek  and  intent  look 
and  almost  angry  way  of  tossing  the  dice 

71 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

and  dropping  the  chips,  they  are  gam- 
bling. 

That  is  an  only  son  seated  there  at 
another  table.  He  had  had  all  art,  all 
culture,  all  refinement,  showered  upon 
him  by  his  parents.  That  is  the  way  he 
is  paying  them  for  their  kindness.  That 
is  a  young  married  man.  A  few  months 
ago  he  made  promises  of  fidelity  and 
kindness,  every  one  of  which  he  has 
broken.  Around  a  table  in  the  club- 
house there  is  a  group  telling  vile  stories. 
It  is  getting  late  now,  and  three-fourths 
of  the  members  of  the  club  are  intoxi- 
cated. The  conversation  has  got  to  be 
groveling,  base,  filthy,  outrageous.  Time 
to  shut  up.  The  young  men  saunter 
forth,  those  who  can  walk,  and  balance 
themselves  against  the  lamp-post  or  the 
fence.  A  young  man  not  able  to  get  out 
has  a  couch  extemporized  for  him  in  the 
club-house  or  by  two  comrades  not  quite 
so  overcome  with  strong  drink,  he  is  led 
to  his  father's  house,  and  the  door-bell 

72 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

rung,  and  the  door  opens,  and  these  two 
imbecile  escorts  usher  into  the  front  hall 
— a  drunken  son.  There  are  dissipating 
club-houses  which  would  do  well  if  they 
could  make  a  contract  with  Inferno  to 
furnish  ten  thousand  men  a  year,  and 
do  that  for  twenty  years,  on  the  condi- 
tion that  no  more  would  be  asked  of 
them.  They  would  save — the  dissipating 
club-houses  of  this  country  would  save 
— hundreds  of  homesteads,  and  bodies, 
minds,  and  souls  innumerable.  But  there 
is  a  vast  difference  between  club-houses. 
Now,  what  is  the  principle  by  which 
we  are  to  judge  in  regard  to  the  profit- 
able or  baleful  influence  of  a  club-house  ? 
That  is  the  practical  and  the  eternal 
question  which  hundreds  of  men  to-day 
are  settling.  First,  I  would  have  you 
test  your  club-house  by  the  influence  it 
has  upon  home,  if  you  have  a  home.  I 
have  been  told  by  prominent  men  that 
three-fourths  of  the  members  are  mar- 
ried men.  That  wife  has  lost  her  influ- 

78 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

cnce  over  her  husband  who  takes  every 
evening's  absence  as  an  assault  upon  do- 
mesticity. How  are  the  great  enterprises 
of  art,  and  literature,  and  education,  and 
the  public  weal  to  go  on  if  every  man 
has  his  world  bounded  by  his  doorstep 
on  one  side,  and  his  back  window  on  the 
other,  his  thoughts  rising  no  higher  than 
his  own  attic,  going  down  no  deeper  than 
his  own  cellar?  When  a  wife  objects  to 
a  husband's  absence  for  some  elevating 
purpose,  she  breaks  her  scepter  of  con- 
jugal power. 

There  should  be  no  protest  on  the  part 
of  the  wife  if  the  husband  goes  forth  to 
some  practical,  useful,  honorable  mis- 
sion. But,  alas!  for  the  fact  that  so 
many  men  sacrifice  all  home-life  for  the 
club-house.  Genial  as  angels  at  the  club- 
house, ugly  as  sin  at  home.  Generous  to 
a  fault  for  all  wine  suppers,  but  stingy 
about  the  wife's  dress  or  the  children's 
shoes.  That  which  might  have  been 
healthy  recreation  has  become  a  usurpa- 
74 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

tion  of  his  affections,  and  he  has  mar- 
ried it,  and  he  is  guilty  of  moral  bigamy. 

Membership  in  some  of  the  clubs  al- 
ways means  domestic  shipwreck.  In  ten 
years  he  is  a  wine-guzzler,  and  his  wife 
is  broken-hearted  or  prematurely  old, 
and  his  property  is  lost  or  reduced,  and 
his  home  is  a  mere  name  in  a  directory. 

Now,  here  are  two  highways  into  the 
great  future,  the  Christian  highway  and 
the  unchristian;  the  one  safe,  the  other 
dangerous.  Anything  that  makes  me  for- 
get that,  is  a  bad  institution.  Would 
you,  in  the  closing  moments  of  your  life, 
rather  have  the  cup  of  Belshazzarean 
wassail  put  to  your  lip,  or  the  cup  of  holy 
communion?  Would  you  rather  have 
for  eternal  companions  the  swearing, 
carousing,  vile,  crew  that  surround  the 
table  in  a  dissipating  club-house,  or  the 
little  child,  the  bright  girl  that  God  took? 
You  would  not  have  been  away  so  many 
nights  if  you  had  thought  she  was  going 
so  soon.  Your  wife  has  never  bright- 

76 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

ened  up  since  then.  She  has  not  got 
over  it.  She  never  will  get  over  it. 
What  a  pity  it  is  that  you  cannot  spend 
more  evenings  at  home  consoling  that 
great  sorrow!  You  can't  drown  that 
grief  in  a  wine  cup !  You  cannot  forget 
those  little  arms  that  were  thrown  around 
your  neck  while  she  said:  "Papa,  do 
stay  home  to-night,  do  stay  home  to- 
night!" You  cannot  wipe  from  your 
lips  the  dying  kiss  of  that  little  child. 
And  yet,  there  has  been  many  a  man  so 
completely  overborne  by  the  fascinations 
of  a  dissipating  club-house,  that  he  went 
off  the  night  the  child  was  dying  of 
scarlet  fever.  He  came  back  about  mid- 
night, it  was  all  over.  The  eyes  were 
closed.  The  undertaker  had  done  his 
work.  The  wife  lay  unconscious  in  the 
next  room.  He  came  up  stairs,  and  he 
saw  the  empty  cradle,  and  saw  the  win- 
dow was  up.  He  said  "What  is  the  mat- 
ter?" In  God's  judgment  day  he  will 
find  out  what  was  the  matter. 
N 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

The  lightning  may  flash  this  way  and 
may  flash  that  way,  upon  the  mountains 
and  the  ravines,  but  take  the  lamp  of 
God's  eternal  truth,  and  flash  it  upon  all 
the  club-houses  so  that  no  young  man 
shall  be  deceived.  By  these  tests  try 
them.  Leave  the  dissipating  influences 
of  the  club-room,  if  the  influences  of 
your  club-room  are  dissipating!  Pure 
hearts  and  honest  lives  do  not  survive 
a  dissipating  club-house.  Let  not  time 
chisel  your  epitaph :  "Here  lies  the  vic- 
tim of  a  dissipating  club-house."  I 
want  you  to  understand  that  the  dissipat- 
ing club-house  is  one  of  the  broadest, 
highest,  mightiest  gates  of  hell. 

Gate  the  second:  The  dissolute  dance. 
— I  will  not  divert  to  the  general  sub- 
ject of  dancing.  Whatever  you  may 
think  about  the  parlor  dance,  or  the 
methodic  motion  of  the  body  to  sounds 
of  music  in  the  family  or  the  social  cir- 
cle, I  am  not  now  discussing  that  ques- 
tion. I  want  you  to  recognize  the  fact 

77 


THE   GATES  OF  HELL 

that  there  is  a  dissolute  dance.  It  is  seen 
not  only  in  the  low  haunts  of  death,  but 
in  elegant  mansions.  It  is  the  first  step 
to  eternal  ruin  for  a  grat  multitude  of 
both  sexes. 

You  kfiow,  as  well  as  I  do,  what  pos- 
tures and  attitudes  and  figures  are  sug- 
gested of  the  devil.  They  who  glide 
into  the  dissolute  dance  glide  over  an 
inclined  plane,  and  the  dance  is  swifter 
and  swifter,  wilder  and  wilder,  until,  with 
the  speed  of  lightning,  they  whirl  off  the 
edges  of  a  decent  life  into  a  fiery  future. 
This  gate  of  hell  swings  across  the  Ax- 
minster  of  many  a  fine  parlor  and  across 
the  dance-hall  of  many  summer  resorts. 
We  have  no  right  to  take  an  attitude  to 
the  sound  of  music  which  would  be  un- 
becoming in  the  absence  of  music. 

Gate  the  third:  Indiscreet  apparel. — 
The  attire  of  woman  for  the  last  five 
years  has  been  beautiful  and  graceful  be- 
yond anything  I  have  ever  known;  but 
there  are  those  that  will  always  carry 
ft 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

that  which  is  right  into  the  extraordinary 
and  indiscreet.  I  charge  Christian  wom- 
en neither  by  style  of  dress  nor  adjust- 
ment of  apparel  to  become  administra- 
tive of  evil.  Perhaps  none  else  will  dare 
to  tell  you,  so  I  will  tell  you  that  there 
are  multitudes  of  men  who  owe  their 
eternal  damnation  to  the  boldness  of 
womanly  attire. 

Show  me  the  fashion-plates  of  any 
age  between  this  and  the  time  of  Louis 
the  Sixteenth,  of  France,  and  I  will  tell 
you  the  type  of  morals  or  immorals  of 
that  age  or  that  year.  No  exception  to 
it.  Modest  apparel  always  indicates  a 
righteous  people.  Immodest  apparel  al- 
ways indicates  a  contaminated  and  a  de- 
praved society.  You  wonder  that  the 
city  of  Tyre  was  destroyed  with  such  a 
terrible  destruction.  Have  you  ever  seen 
the  fashion-plates  of  Tyre? 

I  will  show  it  to  you:     "Moreover, 
the  Lord  saith,  because  the  daughters  of 
Zion     are     haughty     and     walk     with 
tl 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

stretched- forth  necks  and  wanton  eyes, 
walking  and  mincing  as  they  go,  and  mak- 
ing a  tinkling  with  their  feet,  in  that  day 
the  Lord  will  take  away  the  bravery  of 
their  tinkling  ornaments  about  their  feet, 
and  their  cauls,  and  their  round  tires 
like  the  moon,  the  rings  and  nose- jew  els, 
the  changeable  suits  of  apparel,  and  the 
mantels,  and  the  wimples,  and  the  crisp- 
ing-pins"  (Isaiah  3:16-22).  That  is  the 
fashion-plate  of  ancient  Tyre.  Do  you 
wonder  that  God  in  His  indignation 
blotted  out  the  city? 

Gate  the  fourth:  Alcoholic  beverage. 
— All  the  scenes  of  wickedness  are  under 
the  enchantemnt  of  the  wine-cup.  That 
is  what  the  waitresses  carry  on  the  plat- 
ter. That  is  what  glows  on  the  table. 
That  is  what  shines  in  illuminated  gar- 
dens. That  is  what  flushes  the  cheeks 
of  the  patrons  who  come  in.  That  is 
what  staggers  the  step  of  the  patrons  as 
they  go  out.  The  wine-cup  is  the  pattern 
of  impurity.  The  officers  of  the  law 
80 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

tell  us  that  nearly  all  men  who  go  into 
the  shambles  of  death  go  in  intoxicated, 
the  mental  and  spiritual  abolished,  that 
the  brute  may  triumph. 

Tell  me  a  young  man  drinks,  and  I 
know  the  whole  story.  If  he  becomes  a 
captive  of  the  wine-cup,  he  will  become 
a  captive  of  all  other  vices,  only  give 
him  time.  No  one  ever  knows  drunken- 
ness alone.  That  is  a  carrion-crow  that 
goes  in  a  flock,  and  when  you  see  that 
beak  ahead,  you  may  know  the  other 
beaks  are  coming.  In  other  words,  the 
wine-cup  unbalances  and  dethrones  one's 
better  judgment,  and  leaves  one  the  prey 
of  all  evil  appetites  that  may  choose  to 
alight  upon  his  soul.  There  is  not  a 
place  of  any  kind  of  sin  in  the  United 
States  to-day  that  does  not  find  its  chief 
abettor  in  the  chalice  of  inebriety.  There 
is  either  a  drinking-bar  before,  or  be- 
hind, or  above,  or  underneath.  The  of- 
ficers of  the  law  have  said  to  me :  "These 
people  escape  legal  penalty  because  they 

81 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

are  all  licensed  to  sell  liquor."  Then  I 
have  said  to  myself:  "The  courts  that 
license  strong  drink,  license  gambling- 
houses,  license  libertinism,  license  disease, 
license  death,  license  all  sufferings,  all 
crimes,  all  despoliations,  all  disasters,  all 
murders,  all  woe.  It  is  the  courts  and 
the  legislatures  that  are  swinging  wide 
open  this  grinding,  creaky,  stupendous 
gate  of  hell." 

But  you  say,  "You  have  described 
these  gates  of  hell,  and  shown  us  how 
they  swing  in  to  allow  the  entrance  of 
the  doomed.  Will  you  not  tell  us  how 
these  gates  may  swing  out  to  allow  the 
escape  of  the  penitent?"  I  reply,  but 
very  few  escape. 

Of  the  thousand  that  go  in,  nine  hun- 
dred and  ninety-nine  perish.  Suppose 
one  of  these  wanderers  should  knock  at 
your  door,  would  you  admit  her?  Sup- 
pose you  knew  where  she  came  from, 
would  you  ask  her  to  sit  down  at  your 
4ining-table  ?  Would  you  ask  her  to  be- 
82 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

come  the  governess  of  your  children? 
Would  you  introduce  her  among  your 
own  acquaintances?  Would  you  take 
the  responsibility  of  pulling  on  the  out- 
side of  the  gate  of  hell  while  she  pushed 
on  the  inside  of  that  gate  crying  to  get 
out  ?  You  would  not — not  one  of  a  thou- 
sand of  you  that  would  dare  to  do  it. 
You  write  beautiful  poetry  over  her  sor- 
rows, and  weep  over  her  misfortunes, 
but  give  her  practical  help  you  never 
will.  There  is  not  one  person  out  of 
a  thousand  that  will — there  is  not  one 
out  of  five  thousand  that  has  come  so 
near  the  Master's  heart  as  to  dare  to  help 
one  of  these  fallen  souls. 

But  you  ask :  "Are  there  no  ways  of 
escape  for  the  poor  wanderers?"  "Oh, 
yes;  three  or  four.  The  one  way  is  the 
sewing-girl's  garret,  dingy,  cold,  hunger- 
blasted."  But  you  say,  "Is  there  no 
other  way  for  her  to  escape?"  Oh,  yes. 
Another  way  is  the  street  that  leads  to 
the  river,  at  midnight,  the  end  of  the 

85 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

city  dock,  the  moon  shining  down  on  the 
water  making  it  look  so  smooth  she  won- 
ders if  it  is  deep  enough.  It  is.  No 
watchman  near  enough  to  hear  her 
plunge.  No  boatman  near  enough  to 
pick  her  out  before  she  sinks  the  third 
time.  No  other  way?  Yes.  By  the 
curve  of  the  Limited  Express,  at  the 
point  where  the  engineer  cannot  see  a 
hundred  yards  ahead  to  the  form  that 
lies  across  the  track.  He  may  whistle 
"down  brakes,"  but  not  soon  enough  to 
disappoint  the  one  who  seeks  her  death. 

But  you  say,  "Isn't  God  good,  and 
won't  He  forgive?"  Yes;  but  man  will 
not,  woman  will  not,  society  will  not. 
The  Church  of  God  says  it  will,  but  it 
will  not.  Our  work,  then,  is  preventive 
rather  than  cure. 

Those  gates  of  hell  are  to  be  pros- 
trated just  as  certainly  as  God  and  the 
Bible  are  true,  but  it  will  not  be  done 
until  Christian  men  and  women,  quitting 
their  prudery  and  squeamishness  in  this 
14 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

matter,  rally  the  whole  Christian  senti- 
ment of  the  church  and  assail  these 
great  evils  of  society.  The  Bible  utters 
its  denunciation  in  this  direction  again 
and  again,  and  yet  the  piety  of  the  day 
is  such  a  namby-pamby  sort  of  thing 
that  you  cannot  even  quote  Scripture 
without  making  somebody  restless.  As 
long  as  this  holy  imbecility  reigns  in  the 
Church  of  God,  sin  will  laugh  you  to 
scorn.  I  do  not  know  but  that  before 
the  Church  wakes  up  matters  will  be- 
come worse  and  worse,  and  that  there 
will  have  to  be  one  lamb  sacrificed  from 
each  of  the  most  carefully  guarded 
folds,  and  the  wave  of  uncleanness  dash 
to  the  spire  of  the  village  church  and 
the  top  of  the  cathedral  pillar. 

Prophets  and  patriarchs,  and  apostles 
and  evangelists,  and  Christ  Himself 
have  thundered  against  these  sins  as 
against  no  other,  and  yet  there  are  those 
who  think  we  ought  to  take,  when  we 
speak  of  these  subjects,  a  tone  apolo- 

85 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

getic.  I  put  my  foot  on  all  the  conven- 
tional rhetoric  on  this  subject,  and  I  tell 
you  plainly  that  unless  you  give  up  that 
sin  your  doom  is  sealed,  I  rally  you  to 
a  besiegement  of  the  gates  of  hell.  We 
want  in  this  besieging  host  no  soft  sen- 
timentalists, but  men  who  are  willing 
to  give  and  take  hard  knocks.  The 
gates  of  Ghaza  were  carried  off;  the 
gates  of  Thebes  were  battered  down ;  the 
gates  of  Babylon  were  destroyed,  and 
the  gates  of  hell  are  going  to  be  pros- 
trated. 

The  Christianized  printing  press  will 
be  rolled  up  as  the  chief  battering-ram. 
Then  there  will  be  a  long  list  of  aroused 
pulpits,  which  shall  be  assailing  fortress- 
es, and  God's  red-hot  truth  shall  be  the 
flying  ammunition  of  the  contest;  and 
the  sappers  and  the  miners  will  lay  the 
train  under  these  foundations  of  sin  and 
at  just  the  right  time  God,  who  leads  on 
the  fray,  will  cry,  "Down  with  the 
gates!"  and  the  explosion  beneath  will 
81 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

be  answered  by  all  the  trumpets  of  God 
on  high,  celebrating  universal  victory. 

But  there  may  be  one  wanderer  that 
ivould  like  to  have  a  kind  word  calling 
homeward.  I  have  told  you  that  society 
has  no  mercy.  Did  I  hint,  at  an  earlier 
point  in  this  subject,  God  will  have  mer- 
cy upon  any  wanderer  who  would  like 
to  come  back  to  the  heart  of  infinite  love? 

A  cold  Christmas  night  in  a  farm 
house.  Father  comes  in  from  the  barn, 
knocks  the  snow  from  his  shoes,  and  sits 
down  by  the  fire.  The  mother  sits  at 
the  stand  knitting.  She  says  to  him, 
"Do  you  remember  it  is  the  anniversary 
to-night?"  The  father  is  angered.  He 
never  wants  any  allusion  to  the  fact  that 
one  had  gone  away,  and  the  mere  sug- 
gestion that  it  was  the  anniversary  of 
that  sad  event  made  him  quite  rough,  al- 
though the  tears  ran  down  his  cheeks. 
The  old  house  dog,  that  had  played  with 
the  wanderer  when  she  was  a  child, 
comes  up  and  puts  his  head  on  the  old 
t? 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

man's  knee,  but  he  roughly  repulses  the 
dog.  He  wants  nothing  to  remind  him 
of  the  anniversary  day. 

A  cold  winter  night  in  a  city  church. 
It  is  Christmas  night.  They  have  been 
decorating  the  sanctuary.  A  lost  wan- 
derer of  the  street,  with  thin  shawl  about 
her,  attracted  by  the  warmth  and  light, 
comes  in  and  sits  near  the  door.  The 
minister  of  religion  is  preaching  of  Him 
who  was  wounded  for  our  transgres- 
sions and  bruised  for  our  iniquities,  and 
the  poor  soul  by  the  door  said:  "Why 
that  must  mean  me ;  mercy  for  the  chief 
of  sinners;  bruised  for  our  iniquities; 
wounded  for  our  transgressions." 

The  music  that  night  in  the  sanctuary 
brought  back  the  old  hymn  which  she 
used  to  sing  when,  with  father  and 
mother,  she  worshiped  in  the  village 
church.  The  service  over,  the  minister 
went  down  the  isle.  She  said  to  him: 
"Were  those  words  for  me?"  'Wounded 
for  our  transgressions/  was  that  for 

n 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

me?''  The  minister  understood  her  not. 
He  knew  not  how  to  comfort  a  ship- 
wrecked soul,  and  he  passed  on  and  he 
passed  out.  The  poor  wanderer  follow- 
ed into  the  street. 

"What  are  you  doing  here,  Meg?" 
said  the  police.  "What  are  you  doing 
here  to-night?"  "Oh,"  she  replied,  "I 
was  in  to  warm  myself";  and  then  the 
rattling  cough  came,  and  she  held  to  the 
railing  until  the  paroxysm  was  over.  She 
passed  on  down  the  street,  falling  from 
exhaustion;  recovering  herself  again, 
until  after  awhile  she  reached  the  out- 
skirts of  the  city,  and  passed  on  into 
the  country  road.  It  seemed  so  famil- 
iar; she  kept  on  the  road,  and  she  saw 
in  the  distance  a  light  in  the  window. 
Ah!  that  light  had  been  gleaming  there 
every  night  since  she  went  away.  On 
that  country  road  she  passed  until  she 
came  to  the  garden  gate.  She  opened 
it  and  passed  up  the  path  where  she 
played  in  childhood.  She  came  to  the 
M 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

steps  and  looked  in  at  the  fire  on  the 
hearth.  Then  she  put  her  fingers  to  the 
latch.  Oh,  if  that  door  had  been  locked 
she  would  have  perished  on  the  thres- 
hold, for  she  was  near  to  death!  But 
the  door  had  not  been  locked  since  the 
time  she  went  away.  She  pushed  open 
the  door.  She  went  in  and  lay  down  on 
the  hearth  by  the  fire.  The  old  house 
dog  growled  as  he  saw  her  enter,  but 
there  was  something  in  the  voice  that  he 
recognized,  and  he  frisked  about  her  un- 
til he  almost  pushed  her  down  in  his  joy. 

In  the  morning  the  mother  came  down, 
and  she  saw  a  bundle  of  rags  on  the 
hearth ;  but  when  the  face  was  uplifted, 
she  knew  it,  and  it  was  no  more  old 
Meg  of  the  street.  Throwing  her  arms 
around  the  returned  prodigal,  she  cried, 
"Oh,  Maggie!"  The  child  threw  her 
arms  around  her  mother's  neck,  and  said, 
"Oh,  mother!"  and  while  they  were  em- 
braced a  rugged  form  towered  above 
them.  It  was  the  father.  The  severity 

90 


THE  GATES  OF  HELL 

all  gone  out  of  his  face,  he  stooped  and 
took  her  up  tenderly  and  carried  her  to 
mother's  room,  and  laid  her  down  on 
mother's  bed,  for  she  was  dying.  Then 
the  lost  one,  looking  up  into  her  mother's 
face,  said :  "  'Wounded  for  our  trans- 
gressions, and  bruised  for  our  iniqui- 
ties !'  Mother,  do  you  think  that  means 
me?"  "Oh,  yes,  my  darling/'  said  the 
mother.  "If  mother  is  so  glad  to  get 
you  back,  don't  you  think  God  is  glad  to 
get  you  back?" 

And  there  she  lay  dying,  and  all  their 
dreams  and  all  their  prayers  were  filled 
with  the  words,  "Wounded  for  our  trans- 
gressions, bruised  for  our  iniquities/' 
until,  just  before  the  moment  of  her  de- 
parture, her  face  lightened  up,  showing 
the  pardon  of  God  had  dropped  upon 
her  soul.  And  there  she  slept  away  on 
the  bosom  of  her  pardoning  Redeemer. 
So  the  Lord  took  back  one  whom  the 
world  rejected. 


The  Cauldron  of  Woe 

Noah  did  the  best  and  the  worst  thing 
for  the  world.  He  built  an  ark  against 
the  deluge  of  water,  but  introduced  a 
deluge  against  which  the  human  race  has 
ever  since  been  trying  to  build  an  ark — 
the  deluge  of  drunkenness.  In  the  open- 
ing chapters  of  the  Bible  we  hear  his 
staggering  steps.  Shem  and  Japhet 
tried  to  cover  up  the  disgrace,  but  there 
he  is,  drunk  on  wine  at  a  time  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  world  when,  to  say  the  least, 
there  was  no  lack  of  water. 

Inebriation  having  entered  the  world, 
has  not  retreated.  Ever  since  apples  and 
grapes  and  wheat  grew  the  world  has 
been  tempted  to  unhealthful  stimulants. 
But  the  intoxicants  of  the  olden  time 
were  an  innocent  beverage,  a  harmless 
orangeade,  a  quiet  syrup,  a  peaceful 
soda  water,  as  compared  with  the  liquids 
of  modern  inebriation,  into  which  a  mad* 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

ness,  and  a  fury,  and  a  gloom,  and  a  fire, 
and  a  suicide,  and  a  retribution  have 
mixed  and  mingled.  Fermentation  was 
always  known,  but  it  was  not  until  a 
thousand  years  after  Christ  that  distil- 
lation was  invented. 

While  we  must  confess  that  some  of 
the  ancient  arts  have  been  lost,  the  Chris- 
tian era  is  superior  to  all  others  in  the 
bad  eminence  of  whisky  and  rum  and  gin. 
The  modern  drunk  is  a  hundred-fold 
worse  than  the  ancient  drunk.  Noah  in 
his  intoxication  became  imbecile,  but  the 
victims  of  modern  alcoholism  have  to 
struggle  with  whole  menageries  of  wild 
beasts  and  jungles  of  hissing  serpents  and 
perditions  of  blaspheming  demons.  An 
arch-fiend  arrived  in  our  world,  and  he 
built  an  invisible  cauldron  of  temptation 
and  woe.  He  built  that  cauldron  strong 
and  stout  for  all  ages  and  all  nations. 
First  he  squeezed  into  the  cauldron  the 
juices  of  the  forbidden  fruit  of  Paradise. 
Then  he  gathered  from  it  a  distillation 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

from  the  harvest  fields  and  the  orchards 
of  the  hemispheres.  Then  he  poured  into 
the  cauldron  capsicum,  and  copperas,  and 
logwood,  and  deadly  nightshade,  assault 
and  battery,  and  vitriol,  and  opium,  and 
rum  and  murder,  and  sulphuric  acid,  and 
theft,  and  potash,  and  cochineal,  and  red 
carrots,  and  poverty,  and  death,  and  hops. 
But  it  was  a  dry  compound,  and  it  must 
be  moistened,  and  it  must  be  liquified,  and 
so  the  arch-fiend  poured  into  the  cauldron 
the  tears  of  centuries  of  orphanage  and 
widowhood,  and  he  poured  in  the  blood 
of  twenty  thousand  assassinations.  And 
then  the  arch-fiend  took  a  shovel  that  he 
had  brought  up  from  the  furnaces  be- 
neath and  he  put  the  shovel  into  this 
great  cauldron  and  began  to  stir,  and  the 
cauldron  began  to  heave,  and  rock,  and 
boil,  and  sputter,  and  hiss,  and  smoke, 
and  the  nations  gathered  around  it  with 
cups  and  tankards  and  demijohns  and 
kegs,  and  there  was  enough  for  all,  and 
the  arch-fiend  cried:  "Ah!  champion 

94 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

fiend  am  I.  Who  has  done  more  than  I 
have  for  coffins  and  graveyards  and  pris- 
ons and  insane  asylums,  and  the  populat- 
ing of  the  lost  world?  And  when  this 
cauldron  is  emptied,  I'll  fill  it  again,  and 
I'll  stir  it  again,  and  it  will  smoke  again, 
and  that  smoke  will  join  another  smoke 
— the  smoke  of  torment  that  ascendeth 
forever  and  ever. 

"I  drove  fifty  ships  on  the  rocks  of 
Newfoundland  and  the  Skerries  and  the 
Goodwins.  I  defeated  the  Northern 
army  at  Fredericksburg.  I  have  ruined 
more  Senators  than  will  ever  gather  at 
the  National  Capitol.  I  have  ruined 
more  lords  than  will  gather  in  the  House 
of  Peers.  The  cup  out  of  which  I  ordi- 
narily drink  is  a  bleached  human  skull, 
and  the  upholstery  of  my  palace  is  so 
rich  a  crimson  because  it  is  dyed  in  hu- 
man blood,  and  the  mosaic  of  my  floors 
is  made  up  of  the  bones  of  children 
dashed  to  death  by  drunken  parents,  and 
my  favorite  music — sweeter  than  The 

95 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

Deum  or  triumphal  march — my  favorite 
music 'is  the  cry  of  daughters  turned  out 
at  midnight  on  the  street  because  father 
has  come  home  from  the  carousal  and 
the  shrieking  voices  of  the  sinking 
steamer  because  the  captain  was  not 
himself  when  he  put  the  ship  on  the 
wrong  course.  Champion  fiend  am  I !  I 
have  kindled  more  fires,  I  have  wrung 
out  more  agonies,  I  have  stretched  out 
more  midnight  shadows,  I  have  opened 
more  Golgothas,  I  have  rolled  more 
'juggernauts,  I  have  damned  more  souls 
than  any  other  emissary  of  diabolism. 
Champion  fiend  am  I!" 

Drunkenness  is  the  greatest  evil  of 
this  or  any  other  nation,  and  it  takes  no 
logical  process  to  prove  that  a  drunken 
nation  cannot  long  be  a  free  nation.  Talk 
about  crooked  whisky — by  which  men 
mean  the  whisky  that  does  not  pay  the 
tax  to  government — I  tell  you  all  strong 
drink  is  crooked.  Crooked  otard, 
crooked  wine,  crooked  cognac,  crooked 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

schnapps,  crooked  beer,  crooked  whis- 
key, because  it  makes  a  man's  path 
crooked,  and  his  life  crooked,  and  his 
death  crooked,  and  his  eternity  crooked. 
If  I  could  gather  all  the  armies  of  the 
dead  drunkards  and  have  them  come  to 
resurrection,  and  then  add  to  that  host 
all  the  living  drunkards,  five  and  ten 
abreast,  and  then  if  I  could  have  you 
mount  a  horse  and  ride  along  that  line 
for  review,  you  would  ride  that  horse 
until  he  dropped  from  exhaustion,  and 
you  would  mount  another  horse  and 
ride  until  he  fell  from  exhaustion,  and 
you  would  take  another  and  another, 
and  you  would  ride  along  hour  after 
hour,  and  day  after  day.  Great  hosts  in 
regiments,  in  brigades.  Great  armies  of 
them.  And  if  you  had  voice  enough 
stentorian  to  make  them  all  hear,  and  you 
could  give  the  command,  "Forward, 
march!"  their  first  tramp  would  make 
the  earth  tremble.  I  do  not  care  which 
way  you  look  at  it,  the  evil  is  appalling. 

97 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

Then,  too,  thousands  of  people  are 
born  with  a  thirst  for  strong  drink — a 
fact  too  often  ignored.  Along  some  an- 
cestral lines  there  runs  a  river  of  temp- 
tation. There  are  children  whose  swad- 
dling clothes  are  torn  off  the  shroud  of 
death.  From  the  multitude  of  those 
who  have  the  evil  habit  born  with  them, 
this  army  is  being  augmented.  Many 
good  men  are  being  deceived  by  the 
devilish  advertisements  which  many  of 
our  daily  journals  print.  Bitters  and 
beers  for  health.  Bitters  in  the  black 
bottle,  beer  in  the  brown  bottle,  and 
many  men  not  knowing  there  is  any 
thraldom  of  alcoholism  coming  from 
that  source,  are  going  down,  and  some 
day  a  man  sits  with  the  bottle  of  black 
bitters  on  his  table,  and  the  cork  flies 
out,  and  after  it  flies  a  fiend,  and  clutches 
the  man  by  the  throat  and  says:  "Aha! 
I  have  been  after  you  for  ten  years.  I 
have  got  you  now.  Down  with  you, 
down  with  you!"  Bitters?  Ah!  yes. 

98 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

They  make  a  man's  family  bitter,  and 
his  death  bitter,  and  his  hell  bitter.  Bit- 
ters: A  vast  army  all  the  time  increas- 
ing. And  it  is  as  thoroughly  organized 
as  any  army,  with  commander-in-chief, 
staff-officers,  infantry,  cavalry,  batteries, 
suttlerships,  and  flaming  ensigns,  and 
that  every  candidate  for  office  in  the 
United  States  will  yet  have  to  pronounce 
himself  the  friend  or  foe  of  the  liquor 
traffic. 

Is  it  a  state  evil  or  is  it  a  national 
evil?  Does  it  belong  to  the  North,  or 
does  it  belong  to  the  South  ?  Does  it  be- 
long to  the  East,  or  does  it  belong  to  the 
West?  Ah!  there  is  not  an  American 
river  in  which  its  tears  have  not  fallen, 
and  into  which  its  suicides  have  not 
plunged.  What  ruined  that  Southern 
plantation — every  field  a  fortune  ?  What 
threw  that  New  England  farm  into  de- 
cay and  turned  the  roseate  cheeks  that 
bloomed  at  the  foot  of  the  Green  Moun- 
tains into  the  pallor  of  despair?  What 

99 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

has  smitten  every  street  of  every  village, 
town,  and  city  of  this  continent  with  a 
moral  pestilence?  Strong  drink. 

To  prove  that  it  is  a  national  evil,  I 
call  up  three  States  in  opposite  direc- 
tions— Maine,  Iowa,  and  Georgia.  Let 
them  testify  in  regard  to  this.  State  of 
Maine  says:  "It  is  so  great  an  evil  up 
here  that  we  have  anathematized  it  as  a 
State."  State  of  Iowa  says:  "It  is  so 
great  an  evil  out  here  we  have  pro- 
hibited it  by  constitutional  amendment." 
The  State  of  Georgia  says :  "It  is  so 
great  an  evil  down  here  that  we  have 
made  the  sale  of  strong  drink  a  criminal- 
ity.'' So  the  word  comes  from  all 
sources,  and  it  is  going  to  be  a  Water- 
loo, and  I  want  you  to  be  on  the  right 
side.  Either  drunkenness  will  be  de- 
stroyed in  this  country,  or  the  Ameri- 
can Government  will  be  destroyed. 
Drunkeness  and  free  institutions  are 
coming  into  a  death  grapple. 

100 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

Many  millions  are  waiting  to  see  if 
something  cannot  be  done!  Thousands 
of  drunkards  waiting  who  cannot  go  ten 
minutes  in  any  direction  without  having 
temptation  glaring  before  their  eyes  or 
appealing  to  their  nostrils.  They  fight 
against  it  with  enfeebled  will  and  dis- 
eased appetite,  conquering,  then  surren- 
dering, conquering  again,  and  then  sur- 
rendering, and  crying:  "How  long,  O 
Lord,  how  long  before  the  infamous  so- 
licitations shall  be  gone?" 

And  how  many  mothers  there  are 
waiting  to  see  if  this  national  curse  can- 
not lift!  Oh,  is  that  the  boy  that  had 
the  honest  breath  who  comes  home  with 
breath  vitiated  or  disguised?  What  a 
change!  How  quickly  those  habits  of 
early  coming  home  have  been  changed 
for  the  rattling  of  the  night-key  in  the 
door  long  after  the  last  watchman  has 
gone  by  and  tried  to  see  that  everything 
was  closed  up  for  the  night!  Oh,  what 
a  change  for  that  young  man  who  we 
101 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

had  hope  would  do  something  in  mer- 
chandise, or  in  artizanship,  or  in  a  pro- 
fession, that  would  do  honor  in  the  fam- 
ily name  long  after  mother's  wrinkled 
hands  are  folded  from  the  last  toil !  All 
that  exchanged  for  the  startled  look  as 
the  door-bell  rings,  lest  something  has 
happened.  But,  alas!  poor  old  soul,  she 
has  lived  to  experience  what  Solomon 
said:  "A  foolish  son  is  a  heaviness  to 
his  mother." 

Oh,  what  a  funeral  it  will  be  when 
that  boy  is  brought  home  dead!  And 
how  mother  will  sit  there  and  say :  "Is 
this  my  boy  that  I  used  to  fondle,  and 
that  I  walked  the  floor  with  at  night 
when  he  was  sick?  Is  this  the  boy  for 
whom  I  toiled  until  the  blood  burst  from 
the  tips  of  my  fingers  that  he  might  have 
a  good  start  and  a  good  home?  Lord, 
why  hast  thou  let  me  live  to  see  this? 
Can  it  be  that  these  swollen  hands  are 
the  ones  that  used  to  wander  over  my 
face  when  rocking  him  to  sleep?  Can 

102 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

it  be  that  this  is  the  swollen  brow  that 
I  once  so  rapturously  kissed  ?  Poor  boy, 
how  tired  he  does  look.  I  wonder  who 
struck  him  that  blow  across  the  temples ! 
I  wonder  if  he  uttered  a  dying  prayer! 
Wake  up,  my  son;  don't  you  hear  me? 
Wake  up !  Oh,  he  can't  hear  me !  Dead, 
dead,  dead! 

I  am  not  much  of  a  mathematician, 
and  I  cannot  estimate  it;  but  is  there 
anyone  on  earth  that  is  quick  enough  at 
figures  to  estimate  how  many  mothers 
there  are  who  are  waiting  for  something 
to  be  done?  Aye,  there  are  many  wives 
waiting  for  domestic  rescue.  He  prom- 
ised something  different  from  that  when, 
after  the  long  acquaintance  and  careful 
scrutiny  of  character,  the  hand  and  the 
heart  were  offered  and  accepted.  What 
a  hell  on  earth  a  woman  lives  in  who 
has  a  drunken  husband! 

Oh,  death,  how  lovely  thou  art  to  her, 
and  how  soft  and  warm  thy  skeleton 
hand!  The  sepulchre  at  midnight  in 

108 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

winter  is  a  king's  drawing-room  com- 
pared with  that  woman's  home.  It  is 
not  so  much  the  blow  on  the  head  that 
hurts,  as  the  blow  on  the  heart.  The  rum 
fiend  came  to  the  door  of  that  beautiful 
home  and  opened  the  door  and  stood 
there,  and  said:  "I  curse  this  dwelling 
with  an  unrelenting  curse.  I  curse  that 
father  into  a  maniac.  I  curse  that  moth- 
er into  a  pauper.  I  curse  those  sons  in- 
to vagabonds.  I  curse  those  daughters 
into  profligacy.  Cursed  be  the  bread- 
tray  and  the  cradle.  Cursed  be  the 
couch  and  chair  and  family  Bible  with 
record  of  marriages  and  births  and 
deaths.  Curse  upon  curse."  Oh,  how 
many  wives  are  there  waiting  to  see  if 
something  cannot  be  done  to  shake  these 
frosts  of  the  second  death  off  the  orange 
blossoms!  How  many  are  waiting  to, 
see  what  the  church  of  God  will  do. 
God  is  waiting,  the  God  who  works 
through  human  instrumentalities,  wait- 
ing to  see  whether  this  nation  is  going  to 

104 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

overthrow  this  evil ;  and  if  it  refuse  to  do 
so,  then  God  will  punish  the  nation.  If 
the  church  does  not  do  its  work,  then 
He  will  wipe  it  out  as  he  did  the  church 
of  Ephesus.  If  the  Protestant  and 
Catholic  churches  would  stand  side,  by 
side  the  evil  can  be  overthrown. 

The  two  political  parties — Democratic 
and  Republican — have  done  against  this 
scalding,  blasting,  all-consuming,  damn- 
ing tariff  of  strong  drink!  Nothing. 
The  Democratic  party — in  power  for 
the  most  part  of  the  time  for  forty  years 
— what  did  that  national  party  do  for 
extirpation  of  this  evil?  Nothing,  abso- 
lutely nothing,  appallingly  nothing.  The 
Republican  party  has  been  in  power  for 
nearly  half  a  century — what  has  it  done 
to  extripate  this  evil?  Nothing,  abso- 
lutely nothing,  appallingly  nothing.  We 
must  look  in  another  direction. 

The  church  is  the  grandest  and  most 
glorious  institution  on  earth.  What  has 
it  in  solid  phalanx  accomplished  for  the 

105 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

overthrow  of  drunkenness?  Have  its 
forces  been  marshaled?  No,  not  in  this 
direction. 

The  church  holds  the  balance  of 
power  in  America;  and  if  men  and 
women  who  profess  to  love  the  Lord, 
and  to  love  purity,  and  to  be  the  sworn 
enemies  of  all  uncleanness  and  de- 
bauchery and  sin — if  all  such  would 
march  side  by  side  and  shoulder  to  shoul- 
der, this  evil  would  soon  be  overthrown. 
Think  of  400,000  churches  and  Sunday 
schools  in  Christendom,  marching  shoul- 
der to  shoulder !  How  very  short  a  time 
it  would  take  them  to  put  down  this  evil, 
if  all  the  churches  of  God  were  armed 
on  this  subject ! 

Young  men  of  America,  pass  over  in- 
to the  army  of  temperance.  Whisky, 
good  to  preserve  corpses,  ought  never  to 
turn  you  into  a  corpse.  Tens  of  thou- 
sands of  young  men  and  young  women 
have  been  dragged  out  of  respectability, 
and  out  of  purity,  and  out  of  good  char- 

106 


THE  CAULDRON  OF  WOE 

acter,  and  into  darkness,  by  this  infer- 
nal, fiery  liquid  called  strong  drink. 

Away,  ye  murderous  foe, 

Forever  from  my  sight, 
For  you  I've  suffered  all  my  woes. 

And  still  my  soul's  affright; 
By  you  each  night  around  my  bed, 

Dark  spirits  fill  my  room, 
By  you  my  reason  now  is  fled, 

Which  leaves  my  heart  in  gloom. 


107 


The  Romance  of  Crime 


In  our  time,  you  know,  as  well  as  I, 
that  there  is  a  disposition  to  put  a  halo 
around  iniquity  if  it  is  committed  in  a 
conspicuous  place,  and  if  it  is  wide  re- 
sounding and  of  large  proportions.  In 
this  land  today  there  are  hundreds  of 
men  hiding  behind  the  communion  ta- 
bles and  in  the  churches,  who  have  no 
business  to  be  there  as  professors  of  re- 
ligion. They  expect  to  be  all  right  with 
God,  though  they  are  all  wrong  with 
man.  It  seems  to  me  there  has  not  been 
a  time  in  twenty-five  years  when  this 
latter  truth  needed  more  thoroughly  to 
be  presented  in  the  American  churches. 

A  missionary  in  the  islands  of  the  Pa- 
cific preached  one  Sabbath  on  honesty 
and  dishonesty,  and  on  Monday  he  found 
his  yard  full  of  all  styles  of  goods  which 
the  natives  had  brought.  He  could  not 
understand  it  until  a  native  told  him: 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

"Our  gods  permit  us  to  purloin  goods, 
but  the  God  you  told  us  about  yesterday, 
it  seems,  is  against  these  practices,  and 
so  we  brought  all  the  goods  that  do  not 
belong  to  us,  and  they  are  in  the  yard, 
and  we  want  you  to  help  us  distribute 
them  to  their  rightful  owners."  And 
if  in  all  the  pulpits  of  the  United  States 
to-day  rousing  sermons  could  be 
preached  on  honesty  and  the  evils  of 
dishonesty,  and  arrangement  should  be 
made  by  which  all  the  goods  which  have 
been  improperly  taken  from  one  man 
and  appropriated  by  another  man  and 
should  be  placed  in  a  pile  and  the  light- 
ning's flash  should  set  them  on  fire,  thf 
smoke  would  reach  the  stars. 

Now  look  abroad  and  see  the  facina- 
tions  that  are  thrown  around  the  differ- 
ent styles  of  crime.  The  question  that 
every  man  and  every  woman  has  asked 
has  been,  Should  crime  be  excused  be- 
cause it  is  on  a  large  scale?  Is  iniquity 
guilty  and  to  be  pursued  of  the  law  in 

109 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

proportion  as  it  is  on  a  small  scale  ?  Shall 
we  have  the  prison  for  the  man  who 
steals  an  overcoat  from  the  hat-rack, 
and  Canada  for  a  man  to  range  in  if  he 
has  stolen  a  million? 

Look  upon  the  facinations  thrown 
around  fraud  in  this  country.  You 
know  that  for  years  men  have  been 
made  heroes  of  and  pictorialized  and  in 
various  ways  presented  to  the  public,  as 
though  sometimes  they  were  worthy  of 
admiration  if  they  have  scattered  the 
funds  of  banks,  or  swallowed  great  es- 
tates that  did  not  belong  to  them.  Our 
young  men  have  been  dazed  with  this 
quick  accumulation.  They  have  said: 
"That's  the  way  to  do  it.  What's  the  use 
of  us  plodding  on  with  small  wages  or 
insignificant  salary,  when  we  may  go  in- 
to business  life,  and  with  some  strata- 
gem achieve  such  a  fortune  as  that  man 
has  achieved  ?"  A  different  measure  has 
been  applied  to  the  crime  of  Wall  street 
from  that  which  has  been  applied  to  the 

no 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

spoils  which  a  man  carries  up  Rat  alley. 

So  a  peddler  came  down  from  Ver- 
mont some  years  ago,  took  hold  of  the 
money-market  of  New  York,  flaunted 
his  abomination  in  the  sight  of  all  the 
people,  defied  public  morals  every  day 
of  his  life.  Young  men  looked  up  and 
said,  "He  was  a  peddler  in  one  decade, 
and  in  the  next  one  of  the  monarchs  of 
the  stock  market.  That's  the  way  to  do 
it." 

There  has  been  an  irresistable  im- 
pression going  abroad  among  men  that 
the  poorest  way  to  get  money  is  to  earn 
it.  The  young  man  of  gaudy  attire 
says  to  the  young  man  of  humble  ap- 
parel, "What,  you  only  get  eighteen 
hundred  dollars  a  year?  Why,  that 
would  not  keep  me  in  pin-money.  I 
spend  five  thousand  dollars  a  year." 
"Where  do  you  get  it?"  asks  the  plain 
young  man.  "Oh,  stocks,  enterprises,  all 
that  sort  of  thing,  you  know."  The 
plain  young  man  has  hardly  enough 

ill 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

money  to  pay  his  board,  has  to  wear 
clothes  after  they  are  out  of  fashion, 
and  deny  himself  all  luxuries.  After  a 
while  he  gets  tired  of  his  plodding,  and 
he  goes  to  the  man  who  has  achieved 
suddenly  large  estate,  and  he  says,  "Just 
show  me  how  it  is  done."  And  he  is 
shown.  -He  soon  learns  how,  and  al- 
though he  is  almost  all  the  time  idle  now, 
and  has  resigned  his  position  in  the 
bank,  or  the  factory,  or  the  store,  he  has 
more  money  than  he  ever  had,  trades  off 
his  old  silver  watch  for  a  gold  one  with 
a  flashing  chain,  sets  his  hat  a  little  fur- 
ther over  on  the  side  of  his  head  than 
he  ever  did,  smokes  better  cigars,  and 
more  of  them.  He  has  his  hand  in! 
Now,  if  he  can  escape  the  penitentiary 
for  three  or  four  years,  he  will  get  into 
political  circles,  and  he  will  get  political 
jobs,  and  will  have  something  to  do  with 
the  harbors,  and  pavements,  and  docks. 
Now  he  has  got  so  far  along  he  is  safe 
for  perdition. 

112 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

It  is  quite  a  long  road  to  travel  some- 
times before  a  man  gets  into  the  ro- 
mance of  crime.  Those  are  caught  who 
are  only  in  the  prosaic  stage  of  it.  If 
the  sheriffs  and  constables  would  only 
leave  them  alone  for  a  little  while,  they 
would  steal  as  anybody.  They  might  not 
be  able  to  steal  a  whole  railroad,  but  they 
could  master  a  load  of  pig-iron.  Now, 
I  always  find  a  pleasure  in  seeing  an  es- 
tate like  that  go  to  smash.  It  is  plague 
struck,  and  it  blasts  the  nation.  I  arn 
glad  when  it  goes  into  such  a  wreck  it 
can  never  be  gathered  up  again.  I  want 
it  to  become  so  loathsome  that  young 
men  will  take  warning.  If  God  should 
put  into  money  or  its  representative  the 
capacity  to  go  to  its  lawful  owner,  there 
would  not  be  a  bank  or  a  safety  deposit 
in  the  United  States  whose  walls  would 
not  be  blown  out,  and  mortgages  would 
rip,  and  parchments  would  rend,  and 
gold  would  shoot,  and  beggars  would  get 
on  horse-back,  and  stock  gamblers  would 
go  to  the  almshouse. 
118 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

How  many  dishonesties  in  making  out 
invoices,  and  in  the  plastering  of  false 
lables,  and  in  the  filching  of  customers  of 
rival  houses,  and  in  the  making  and 
breaking  of  contracts.  Young  men  are 
indoctrinated  in  the  idea  that  the  sooner 
they  get  money  the  better,  and  the  get- 
ting of  it  on  a  larger  scale  only  proves  to 
them  their  greater  ingenuity.  There  is  a 
glitter  thrown  around  all  these  things. 
Why,  even  in  our  large  commercial  em- 
poriums, men  and  women  are  forced  to 
lie,  forced  to  cheat,  arid  forced  to  steal 
in  order  to  make  a  decent  livelihood.  The 
rich  owners  place  premiums  upon  old 
styled  goods,  premiums  upon  inferior 
goods,  and  premiums  upon  shopworn 
goods,  and  premiums  upon  damaged 
goods.  Then  they  place  the  stamp  of 
damnation  on  them,  and  instruct  the  un- 
derpaid clerks  to  sell  them,  and  that  they 
will  be  paid  extra  for  so  doing.  It  is 
stealing!  and  the  owners  who  instruct 
their  clerks  to  steal  should  be  brought  to 
swift  judgment. 

114 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

A  young  man  stood  behind  the  coun- 
ter in  New  York  selling  silks  to  a  lady, 
and  he  said  before  the  sale  was  consum- 
mated: "I  see  there  is  a  flaw  in  that 
silk.  "The  lady  recognized  it,  and  the  sale 
was  not  consummated.  The  head  man  of 
the  firm  saw  the  interview,  and  he  wrote 
home  to  the  father  of  the  young  man  liv- 
ing in  the  country,  saying:  "Dear  Sir, 
come  and  take  your  boy;  he  will  never 
make  a  merchant."  The  father  came 
down  from  the  country  home  in  great 
consternation,  as  any  father  would,  won- 
dering what  his  boy  had  done.  He  came 
to  the  store,  and  the  merchant  said  to 
him:  "Why,  your  son  pointed  out  a 
flaw  in  some  silk  the  other  day  and 
spoiled  the  sale,  and  we  will  never  have 
that  lady,  probably,  again  for  a  custo- 
mer, and  your  son  will  never  make  a 
merchant."  "Is  that  all?"  said  the  father. 
"I  am  proud  of  him.  I  wouldn't  for  the 
world  have  him  another  day  under  your 
influence.  John,  get  your  hat,  and  come, 

17C 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

let  us  start."  There  are  thousands  of 
men  and  women  under  the  pressure,  un- 
der the  fascinations  thrown  around  about 
commercial  iniquity.  Thousands  have 
gone  down  under  the  pressure;  other 
thousands  have  maintained  their  integ- 
rity. Let  me  say  to  you,  my  young 
friend,  that  you  can  be  a  great  deal  hap- 
pier in  poverty  than  you  ever  can  be 
happy  in  a  prosperity  which  comes  from 
ill-gotten  gains.  "Oh,"  you  say,  "I 
might  lose  my  place.  It  is  easy  for  you 
to  write  and  talk,  but  it  is  no  easy  thing 
to  get  a  new  place,  when  you  leave  the 
old  one.  Besides  that,  I  have  a  widowed 
mother  depending  upon  my  exertions, 
and  you  must  not  be  too  reckless  in  giv- 
ing advice  to  me."  Well,  my  young 
friend,  it  is  always  safe  to  be  right,  but 
it  is  never  safe  to  be  wrong.  You  go 
home  and  tell  your  mother  the  pressure 
under  which  you  are  in  that  store,  and 
I  know  what  she  will  say  to  you,  if  she 
is  worthy  of  you.  She  will  say:  "Come 
out  from  there;  our  Master  has  taken 

116 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

care  of  us  all  these  years,  and  He  will 
take  care  of  us  now ;  come  out  of  that/' 
Oh,  there  is  a  fearful  fascination  in  the 
romance  of  crime. 

There  are  families  to-day — widows 
and  orphans — with  nothing  between  them 
and  starvation  but  a  sewing  machine,  or 
kept  out  of  the  vortex  by  the  thread  of 
a  needle  red  with  the  blood  of  their 
hearts,  who  were  by  father  or  husband 
left  a  competency.  You  read  the  story 
in  the  newspaper  of  those  who  have  lost 
by  a  bank  defalcation,  and  it  is  only  one 
line,  the  name  of  a  woman  you  never 
heard  of,  and  just  one  or  two  figures 
telling  the  amount  of  stock  she  had,  the 
number  of  shares.  It  is  a  very  short 
line  in  a  newspaper,  but  it  is  a  line  of 
agony  long  as  time ;  it  is  a  story  as  long 
as  eternity. 

Now,  do  not  come  under  the  fascina- 
tion which  induces  men  to  employ  trust 
funds  for  purposes  of  their  own  specula- 
tion. Cultivate  old-fashioned  honesty.  Re- 
in 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

member  the  example  of  Wellington,  who, 
when  he  was  leading  the  British  army 
over  the  French  frontier,  and  his  army 
was  very  hungry,  and  there  was  plenty 
of  plunder  on  the  French  frontier,  and 
some  of  the  men  wanted  to  take  it,  he 
said :  "Soldiers,  do  not  touch  that ;  God 
will  take  care  of  us;  He  will  take  care 
of  the  English  army;  plenty  of  plunder, 
I  know,  all  around,  but  do  not  take  it." 
He  told  the  story  afterward  himself, 
how  the  French  people  brought  to  him 
their  valuables  to  keep — he,  supposed  to 
be  their  enemy — brought  him  their  val- 
uables to  keep.  And  ttei  he  said,  at  a 
time  when  the  creditors  of  the  army  were 
calling  for  money  and  for  pay  all  the 
time,  and  they  had  so  much  all  around 
about  he  did  not  feel  it  right  for  him  to 
take  it,  or  for  the  army  to  take  it.  This 
is  a  kind  of  fear  that  has  seldom 
troubled  conquerors  and  victors,  and  I 
doubt  if  in  the  annals  of  war  present 
anything  comparable  to  this  sublime  sim- 
plicity. 

118 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

There  has  been  a  great  deal  of  fasci- 
nation thrown  around  libertinism.  So- 
ciety is  very  severe  upon  the  impurities 
that  lurks  around  the  alleys  and  low 
haunts  of  the  town.  The  law  pursues  it, 
incarcerates  it,  tries  to  destroy  it.  You 
know  as  well  as  I  that  society  becomes 
lenient  in  proportion  as  impurity  be- 
comes affluent  or  is  in  elevated  circles, 
and  finally  society  is  silent,  or  disposed 
to  palliate.  Where  is  the  judge,  the 
jury,  the  police  officer  that  dare  arraign 
the  wealthy  libertine?  He  walks  the 
streets,  he  rides  the  parks,  he  flaunts  his 
iniquity  in  the  eyes  of  the  pure.  The 
hag  of  uncleanness  looks  out  of  the  tap- 
estried window.  Where  is  the  law  that 
dares  take  the  brazen  wretches  and  put 
their  faces  in  an  iron  frame  of  a  state 
prison  window? 

Sometimes  it  seems  to  me  as  if  society 
were  going  back  to  the  state  of  morals 
of  Herculaneum,  when  it  sculptured  its 
vileness  on  pillars  and  temple  walls,  and 
nothing  but  the  lava  of  a  burning  moun- 

119 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

tain  could  hide  the  immensity  of  crime. 
We  have  got  to  understand  that  iniquity 
is  just  as  bad  in  the  pallatial  home  as  it 
is  in  the  slums  of  a  large  city. 

Now  do  not  be  fascinated  by  the 
glamor  thrown  over  crime  of  whatever 
sort.  Because  others  have  habits  that 
seem  glittering  and  brilliant,  but  yet  at 
the  same  time  are  wicked,  do  not  choose 
such  faults.  Stand  independent  of  all 
such  influences.  Cultivate  old-fashioned 
honesty. 

Then  there  is  the  fascination  of 
strong  drink  and  the  use  of  drugs,  which 
destroy  the  reason  and  makes  beggars  of 
us  all.  The  following  authentic  story  is 
a  fitting  climax  to  all  who  are  brought 
under  the  terrible  influence  of  this  dam- 
nable stuff,  called  strong  drink,  or  its 
twin  devil,  the  drug  habit : 

"Not  long  since  the  daily  papers  had 
much  to  say  relative  to  a  famous  beauty, 
an  actress,  who  had  died  from  the  use 
of  opium.  The  fallen  heroine  in  her 

120 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

earlier  days  was  the  companion  of  many 
notable  men,  men  who  were  mighty  in 
politics  and  business.  The  drug  habit 
was  her  undoing  however,  and  before 
she  crossed  the  great  divide,  her  last 
words  were: 

"Please  give  me  a  pinch  of  hop;  let 
me  die  dreaming  of  the  past." 

How  terribly  pathetic!  How  awful 
is  the  appeal  for  the  drug  that  had 
blasted  her  life.  This  scorner  of  mil- 
lionaires and  proud  dictator  of  fashions 
fails  to  come  back  across  the  line. 

Let  the  picture  of  this  poor,  fallen 
creature  be  the  means  of  saving  others 
from  her  sad  fate.  It  may  be  that  God 
in  his  wisdom  has  used  her  in  some  mys- 
terious way  to  accomplish  that  which 
mortal  exhortation  cannot  do. 

Returning  to  the  subject  of  this  sketch, 
we  see  the  poor  withered  creature  as  the 
grey  light  of  evening  crept  into  the  dingy 
little  Bridewell  hospital  ward;  an  old 
woman's  bleary  eyes  lightened,  gleamed 

121 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

and  became  set  with  a  new  luster  as  a 
glimpse  of  the  old  days  of  splendor 
showed  for  a  moment  before  the  curtain 
of  death  veiled  the  fleeting  vision. 

Anna ,  yellowest  and  most  wrink- 
led of  the  women  from  "across  the  line,51 
died  smiling.  A  last  bit  of  drug  had  sent 
her  once  more  within  the  wonderland  of 
other  years. 

Time  was  when  Anna was  the 

most  talked  of  woman  in  Chicago.  Those 
were  the  days  when  the  "Black  Crook" 
was  having  a  phenomenal  run  at  a  local 
theater,  and  when  "Beautiful  Anna/'  as 
she  was  known  to  all  Chicago's  young 
gallants,  was  the  one  and  only  attraction 
of  the  show. 

Those  were  the  days  when  Anna  was 
young,  when  the  women  of  the  most  ex- 
clusive society  circles  copied  her  hats 
and  gowns  and  named  new  creations  of 
fashion  in  her  honor.  Those  were  the 
days  when  "great  men"  were  her  com- 
panions and  numbered  among  her  closest 

111 


THE  ROMANCE  OF  CRIME 

friends.  That  was  the  fairyland  before 
the  days  of  morphia  and  waning  beauty, 
and  before  the  days  that  Anna  stepped 
across  to  "the  other  side  of  the  line." 

But  the  girl  would  have  nothing  of 
her  admirers  in  those  years — except  the 
jewels  and  money  they  showered  upon 
her.  Life  was  too  gay  to  mar  with  mar- 
riage. And  before  she  knew  it,  "Beauti- 
ful Anna"  was  growing  old. 

"I  am  dying,"  she  moaned  to  the  phy- 
sician who  stood  beside  her  bed. 
"Won't  you  give  me  just  a  pinch  of  hop? 
I — I  want  to  die  dreaming  of  the  past. 
I — I  was  'Beautiful  Anna'  once." 

The  well-meaning  prison  evangelist, 
who  bent  over  her  with  a  prayer  on  his 
lips  for  the  safe  passage  of  the  soul, 
raised  his  brows  askance,  but  Anna  was 
given  her  pinch  of  hop.  The  shadows 
of  death  blended  into  her  dreaming.  She 
was  smiling  when  her  hands  were  crossed 
upon  her  breast." 


13* 


UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS-URBANA 

170W694C  C001 

CHICAGO  BY  GASLIGHT.  CHGO 


30112025275097 


